New mental status exam detects mild impairment

The Saint Louis University Mental Status or "SLUMS" exam may be superior to the traditional Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) in detecting mild cognitive impairment, according to a report released this month.

The MMSE is widely used to screen for dementia, but it is limited in its ability to identify mild neurocognitive disorder, Dr. Syed H. Tariq and colleagues from St. Louis University School of Medicine in Missouri explain in their report.

Therefore, they compared the sensitivity and specificity of the SLUMS examination to the MMSE for detecting mild neurocognitive disorder and dementia in 705 participants.

They found that SLUMS was significantly better than MMSE for detecting mild neurocognitive disorder. The between-test differences were less marked for detecting dementia. The results were similar for participants with or without a high school education, the report indicates.

Animal naming, delayed recall, digit span, correct time on the clock drawing, and immediate paragraph recall measured by the SLUMS significantly discriminated normal patients from patients with mild neurocognitive disorder, the researchers note.

"The present analysis showed that the sensitivity and specificity appear similar for both SLUMS and MMSE in detecting dementia, but the SLUMS appeared to be possibly better than the MMSE for differentiating mild neurocognitive disorder from normal cognitive functioning," the authors conclude.

SOURCE: American Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, November 2006.