ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: Detecting and treating dementia at an early stage are important. Although the Revised Hasegawa Dementia Scale (HDS-R) is commonly used to detect dementia, it takes about 10 min to complete. In contrast, the 1-min animal test (OMAT) takes only 1 min to complete and may be a helpful screening test for general practitioners in deciding whether to proceed with administering further diagnostic tests such as the HDS-R. We sought to examine the relationship between the OMAT and HDS-R scores, and determine the cut-off OMAT score that balanced the sensitivity and specificity in identifying HDS-R-positive patients. METHODS: A total of 122 consecutive patients with diabetes who visited the outpatient clinic at the Fujiidera Municipal Hospital were enrolled. The patients underwent the OMAT and HDS-R on the same day. Tests were conducted in a single-blinded manner. The relationship between the OMAT and HDS-R scores was examined using Spearman's rank correlation. Receiver operating characteristic curve analysis was performed to identify the optimal cut-off score of OMAT that will determine whether to proceed with further diagnostic tests. RESULTS: A strong positive correlation between the OMAT and HDS-R scores was observed (r = 0.70). The sensitivity and specificity of OMAT using cut-off scores of 12/13, 13/14, and 14/15 for HDS-R-positive patients were 0.87 and 0.66, 1.00 and 0.51, and 1.00 and 0.40, respectively among all the subjects. Similar results were obtained in a subgroup of subjects aged ≥ 65 years. CONCLUSIONS: A cut-off score of 13/14 on the OMAT balanced the sensitivity closest to 1.00 and allowed for the highest specificity for the HDS-R not only among all the patients, but also among just the patients aged ≥ 65 years. The OMAT may be an optimal screening test to determine whether to proceed with further diagnosis using HDS-R.Trial registration UMIN UMIN000025260. This study is retrospectively registered on December 13th, 2016.
ABSTRACT
Nutritional status affects well-being and survival in patients who are undergoing hemodialysis. It was examined how maintenance hemodialysis altered body fat mass. In 72 patients with chronic renal failure (age, 62 +/- 12 yr; 42 men, 30 women), body fat was measured by dual x-ray absorptiometry 1 mo after initiation of maintenance hemodialysis and approximately 1 yr later (mean +/- SD, 11 +/- 2 mo). The second measurement showed significantly greater body fat mass than the first (11.38 +/- 3.84 versus 10.09 +/- 4.12 kg; P < 0.0001). After calculation of the change in body fat mass per month, no significant differences were evident in relation to gender or to presence of diabetes. Changes in body fat mass per month correlated negatively with baseline serum albumin concentration (r = -0.449, P < 0.0001) and baseline body fat mass (r = -0.423, P < 0.001). These factors independently influenced the change according to multiple regression analysis (R(2) = 0.323, P < 0.0001). In conclusion, body fat mass increases significantly in the first year of maintenance hemodialysis, especially in patients with poor nutritional status. More general, dual x-ray absorptiometry assessment of body fat mass was found to be useful for evaluating the nutritional status of hemodialysis patients.
