Anyone Care To Take The Test?

[youngmafbog]

http://news.sky.com/story/1194256/dementia-15-minute-test-to-spot-signs-early

On a serious note having first hand experience of dementia I hope this does help.

[woofgang]

They are american and therefore not valid in the UK. Things like "nickels and dimes" make the tests invalid.

[woofgang]

PS, if you are smart enough to understand and do the test notwithstanding that then you don't have alzheimers!

[Hopkirk]

I tried to open a link to this on the BBC site yesterday, but couldn't get it to work.

I wondered if it meant I had failed.

[Baldric]

I walked away when the $ signs came up!

[jno]

not really first-hand, I hope.

It looks pretty simple (ie I don't have dementia). The only one I didn't know was the date. Retired people never know the date.

[woofgang]

Its actually not as simple as that. People also naturally have different kinds of memory and different memory skills. I have no memory whatever for numbers, none at all.
When I worked administering such tests (and this isn't new, the first research valid one I remember was in use when I was a student 40 years ago) I met a well off lady who had worked as an illustrator for botany books. When she started to lose her memory, she used her money to make arrangements for her care, financial management, housekeeping, personal care at need, everything. She had no family and only one close friend. When I assessed her and administered the test, I asked her how she managed day to day stuff she said "My dear I have someone to do it, its all taken care of". She had no idea of the day of the week or the date and didn't care.
Part of the test then was to look at a collection of simple images later on in the test the images were shown again mixed in with new ones and the patient had to say whether or not they had seen the image before. Its not as easy as you might think! This lady aced that part of the test, massively skewing her score. Se knew her diagnosis and problems and so I commented to her on how well she had done despite her damaged memory.
She knew why "Its the artist's eye" she said "it never leaves you"

So interesting? maybe Useful? not especially I don't think, or at least no more useful than existing tools. News? nope.

[jake-the-peg]

You're totally missing the point Woofgang

There is a very similar one GPs in the UK did

When my father started having memory problems I went in with him and he did the test it had a lot of very similar questions

He scored 35 out of 40 as I recall

We went back with him 6 months later and he's scored less than 20, the final time he couldn't complete the test.

OK - he deteriorated very quickly but the point is to try and spot it in early onset.

In some early onset cases there are things that can be done to slow the progression or get people help to cope.

It's not a case of 'you can do the test so you don't have dementia'

[jake-the-peg]

OK you were expanding when I answered

I agree - we already have such tests

but getting them better publicity has to be good

[Sqad]

Difficult ....very difficult.......written tests.

I am always wary of "written tests" for self diagnosis.

Short term memory loss is a normal manifestation of "getting old" which is not a disease as far as I am aware.

If one fails the test, how does one differentiate between the normal process of getting old and indeed the start of one of the dementias?

OR are we now calling the ageing process...a dementia?

In the case of JTP's father, with a marked memory deterioration in a 6 month period, I would guess that it would have been diagnosed without the "mini.memory test."

We must be careful here not to overdiagnose a condition that may be a normal situation.........it has been done before and id still being done.

[woofgang]

jake I agree with sqad (shock horror) I was one of those people who did the assessments and offered coping suggestions. often times there was very little correlation between test results and coping. Attitudes, lifestyle and habits were a much better predictor of successful coping than the test. To the specialist, the areas of the test that are completed correctly or not can be helpful in identifying what skills ands functions are lost or at risk (short term memory, chaining, multitasking, problem solving, response times) but the raw scores and results mena little or nothing.....sorry.