C. Sarasqueta et al., The validity of Hodkinson's Abbreviated Mental Test for dementia screeningin Guipuzcoa, Spain, EUR J NEUR, 8(5), 2001, pp. 435-440
The objective of this research was to evaluate the validity of Hodkinson's
Abbreviated Mental Test (AMT) in screening for dementia and to identify the
optimum cut-off point to use in a prevalence survey. The study included tw
o groups of persons: (i) a random sample of 183 individuals selected from c
ensus data, 96 of whom completed the study and (ii) another 36 persons with
dementia were selected from a hospital outpatients department by sampling
consecutive cases. The DSM-IV criteria were used as the 'gold standard' to
establish a diagnosis of dementia. The AMT was administered to the 132 part
icipants who subsequently underwent independent clinical evaluation. In the
community sample, 11 persons were diagnosed with dementia and 85 without.
In the total sample, a score of 7 maximizes the efficacy of the test. The s
ensitivity for this cut-off point is 91.5% (78.7-97.2%) and the specificity
is 82.4% (72.2-89.5%). A score of 9 gives 100% sensitivity, but the propor
tion of false positives rises to 66%. Our results are consistent with other
studies and Suggest that the AMT is a valid instrument for use in screenin
g for dementia in populations similar to the one in this study.