Clinical efficacy of the 7-Minute Screen at primary care setting

ABSTRACT

BACKGROUND: Because dementia tends to be underdiagnosed, Solomon PR developed a brief neurocognitive screening battery to identify Alzheimer's dementia. The 7-Minute Screen consists of four individual tests(orientation, memory, clock drawing, verbal fluency). It can be rapidly administered and it may be appropriately used in the primary care setting. We attempted to develop a screening tool of dementia based on the 7-Minute Screen at primary care setting in Korea. METHODS: We adapted the 7 Minute Screen to the Korean version of 7 Minute Screen(7 MS-K). 7 MS-K and MMSE-K were administered to 61 elderly people who visited the Sungbuk Public Health Center. Inter-rater reliability and test-retest reliability were evaluated. RESULTS: The 7 MS-K has a sensitivity of 92% and a specificity of 90% for cutoff point of MMSE-K 23/24. Inter-rater reliability and test-retest reliability for the entire battery was very high(both r=1). Mean time of administration was 10 minutes. CONCLUSION: 7 MS-K has a reasonable validity, reliability and can be administered in a brief period, and requires no clinical judgement and minimal training. It may be a useful tool for screening dementias in primary care setting.