Mild Cognitive Impairment: A Concept and Diagnostic Entity in Need of Input from Neuropsychology

Abstract

This virtual issue consists of studies previously published in the Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society and selected on the basis of their content related to one of the most highly researched concepts in behavioral neurology and neuropsychology over the past decade: mild cognitive impairment (MCI). The reliance on cognitive screening measures, staging-based rating scales, and limited neuropsychological testing in diagnosing MCI across most research studies may miss individuals with subtle cognitive declines or mis-diagnose MCI in those who are otherwise cognitively normal on a broader neuropsychological battery of tests. The assembled articles highlight the perils of relying on these conventional criteria for MCI diagnosis and reveal how the reliability of diagnosis is improved when sound neuropsychological approaches are adopted. When these requirements are met, we illustrate with a second series of articles that neuropsychological measures associate strongly with biomarkers and often reflect pathology beyond or instead of typical AD distributions. The final set of articles reveal that people with MCI demonstrate mild but identifiable functional difficulties, and a challenge for neuropsychology is how to incorporate this information to better define MCI and distinguish it from early dementia. Neuropsychology is uniquely positioned to improve upon the state of the science in MCI research and practice by providing critically important empirical information on the specific cognitive domains affected by the predominant neurodegenerative disorders of late life as well as on the diagnostic decision-making strategies used in studies. When such efforts to more comprehensively assess neuropsychological functions are undertaken, better characterizations of spared and impaired cognitive and functional abilities result and lead to more convincing associations with other biomarkers as well as to prediction of clinical outcomes.

Aging and Functional Complex Activities: Clinical and Social Perspectives

“…Functional changes are currently assessed in combination with genetic, neurobiological, neuroimages and cognitive behavioral indicators as one of the risk factors in dementia (Bondi & Smith, 2014;Albert et al 2011).…”

P2‐251: Visuoconstructional Impairment in Subtypes of Mild Cognitive Impairment

“…Indeed, a key advantage of this study was the statistical determination of MCI subtypes using a core group of well researched neuropsychological tests (Libon et al, 2010(Libon et al, , 2014. Thus, MCI subtypes were determined empirically using neurocognitive constructs well known to be affected in both dementia and MCI (Bondi & Smith, 2014;Libon et al, 2014). Previous research has shown evidence for the presence of both singledomain impairments (i.e., amnestic and dysexecutive) and multi-domain MCI subtypes (Delano-Wood et al, 2009;Libon et al, 2010).…”

“…Several common clinical diagnostic criteria for the diagnosis of MCI have been proposed (Petersen, 2004;Winblad et al, 2004). Recently, literature has emerged using person-centered statistical modeling techniques to classify patients with MCI (see Bondi & Smith, 2014, for a review). Research using person-centered statistical modeling techniques to classify patients with MCI has generally been consistent in that patients with singledomain (amnestic/dysexecutive) as well as multi-domain syndromes can be identified (Delano-Wood et al, 2009;Libon et al, 2010).…”

“…Research using person-centered statistical modeling techniques to classify patients with MCI has generally been consistent in that patients with singledomain (amnestic/dysexecutive) as well as multi-domain syndromes can be identified (Delano-Wood et al, 2009;Libon et al, 2010). An advantage to using statistical modeling versus clinical criteria to diagnose and classify MCI subtypes is its objectivity (Bondi & Smith, 2014;Eppig et al, 2012;Libon et al, 2011).…”

Correlation of the Neuropsychological Screening Battery (NSB) and Neuroanatomy for the Parkinson's Disease with Mild Cognitive Impairment by Using the Analysis of Cerebral Cortex Thickness in the Brain MRI

“…파킨슨병의 진행 과정에서 경도 인지장애(mild cognitive impairment. MCI)와 치매를 명 확하게 정의하는 것은 어려움이 따르지만 경도인지장 애는 동일 연령과 교육 수준에 비하여 인지 기능은 저 하되었으나 치매와는 달리 기초적인 생활을 스스로 수행할 수 있거나 전반적 사회 활동에 명백한 지장을 초래하지 않는다는 점에서 구분 할 수 있다 [7] . (magnetic resonance image.…”