Defining and validating a short form Montreal Cognitive Assessment (s-MoCA) for use in neurodegenerative disease

Abstract

Introduction Screening for cognitive deficits is essential in neurodegenerative disease. Screening tests, such as the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA), are easily administered, correlate with neuropsychological performance and demonstrate diagnostic utility. Yet, administration time is too long for many clinical settings. Methods Item response theory and computerised adaptive testing simulation were employed to establish an abbreviated MoCA in 1850 well-characterised community-dwelling individuals with and without neurodegenerative disease. Results 8 MoCA items with high item discrimination and appropriate difficulty were identified for use in a short form (s-MoCA). The s-MoCA was highly correlated with the original MoCA, showed robust diagnostic classification and cross-validation procedures substantiated these items. Discussion Early detection of cognitive impairment is an important clinical and public health concern, but administration of screening measures is limited by time constraints in demanding clinical settings. Here, we provide as-MoCA that is valid across neurological disorders and can be administered in approximately 5 min.

Impacts of ‘two-level’ variability on the differential power for Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) in prodromal dementia

“…In accordance with Roalf et al 1's study, full MoCA demonstrated a relatively high value to discriminate healthy controls from patients with aMCI (area under the curve (AUC) value=0.814, p<0.001, 95% CI (0.749 to 0.878)). The diagnostic accuracy of MoCA was 0.805 (p<0.001, 95% CI (0.728 to 0.882)) for aMCI-sd and 0.947 for aMCI-md (p<0.001, 95% CI (0.911 to 0.982)).…”

“…We read with great interest of the study defining and validating the screening accuracy of short form Montreal Cognitive Assessment (s-MoCA) in individuals with different cognitive status 1. This 5-min s-MoCA is attractive because it achieves the goal for adequate screening of cognitive impairment in an ageing population.…”

Odor Identification Screening Improves Diagnostic Classification in Incipient Alzheimer’s Disease

“…We acknowledge that this can be a significant burden on the clinician. Thus, we recently published a valid brief version of the MoCA, called the s-MoCA [25]. This brief version is 8 questions long and takes approximately 5 minutes to administer.…”

The Spectrum of Functional Rating Scales in Neurology Clinical Trials

“…The disadvantage is that they are complex, require some training and are usually performed using special software programs. Over the last several years, several preexisting neurologic rating scales have been evaluated and revised using LTT models [72][73][74][75].…”