Background and Purpose There are only a few cognitive screening tests for the Chinese-speaking population, and so this study aimed to validate the Chinese version of Addenbrooke's Cognitive Examination III (ACE-III) for detecting mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and mild dementia. Its diagnostic accuracy was compared with the Chinese versions of the Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA). Methods The 176 included individuals were divided into 3 groups: mild dementia group, MCI group, and normal control group. MMSE, MoCA, and ACE-III were administered to all participants by researchers who were blinded to the clinical grouping. The receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were analyzed. Results ACE-III exhibited good internal consistency and convergent validity. Age and education level significantly influenced the total ACE-III scores. When screening MCI, the area under the ROC curve (AUC) was significantly larger for ACE-III than for MMSE (0.88 vs. 0.72, p <0.05) and MoCA (0.88 vs. 0.76, p <0.05). ACE-III showed higher sensitivity (0.75) and specificity (0.89) than MMSE (0.64 and 0.63, respectively) and MoCA (0.67 and 0.77) at the optimal cutoff score of 88/89. For detecting mild dementia, ACE-III yielded satisfactory sensitivity (0.94) and specificity (0.83) at the optimal cutoff score of 74/75. The AUC of ACE-III was 0.95, which was comparable to those of MMSE (0.95) and MoCA (0.91). In participants with ≥12 years of education, the AUC was significantly larger for ACE-III than for MMSE when detecting MCI (0.90 vs. 0.68, p <0.05) and mild dementia (0.97 vs. 0.90, p <0.05). Conclusions The present study has verified that ACE-III is a reliable and accurate tool for screening MCI and mild dementia in the Chinese-speaking population, and is significantly superior to MMSE and MoCA for detecting MCI.

Background/Aims: There are limited cognitive screening tests for the Chinese-speaking population. This study aimed to validate the Chinese version of the Mini-Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination (M-ACE) for detecting mild cognitive impairment (MCI) and mild dementia. Its diagnostic accuracy was compared with that of Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). The study also evaluated the influential factors of M-ACE scores and its convergent validity against Clinical Dementia Rating Scale (CDR) and MMSE. Method: One hundred sixty-nine participants were classified into 3 groups: mild dementia, MCI, and healthy control. Mini-Mental State Examination and M-ACE were administered by researchers who were blinded to the clinical grouping. Receiver operating characteristic curves were graphed to test the diagnostic accuracy. Results: Mini-Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination scores had good convergent validity against CDR and MMSE. Years of education ( r = 0.4, P < .001) yielded significant impacts on M-ACE scores. The optimal cutoff score of M-ACE to detect MCI was 25/26 (sensitivity = 0.88; specificity = 0.72) with an area under curve (AUC) significantly higher than MMSE (0.86 vs 0.72). The optimal cutoff score of M-ACE to screen mild dementia (21/22) yielded satisfactory sensitivity (0.96) and specificity (0.87) with a comparable AUC to MMSE (0.96 vs 0.94). Conclusions: Mini-Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination was a brief and reliable tool to detect MCI and mild dementia in the Chinese-speaking population significantly superior to MMSE when detecting MCI.