Screening tools for dementia assessment in UK based ethnic minorities

Calia, Clara and Parra Rodriguez, Mario (2024) Screening tools for dementia assessment in UK based ethnic minorities. Exploration of Medicine. ISSN 2692-3106 (In Press)

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Abstract

Aim: The present study investigated whether commonly used screening tools and assessments for dementia were culturally appropriate for older adults from ethnic minorities (EM) groups living in the U.K. Method: Both South Asian and British participants (N=43) were assessed using the Cross-linguistic naming test, Mini Addenbrooke’s Cognitive Examination, Visual Short-Term Memory Binding Test (VSTMBT), and the Rowland Universal Dementia Assessment Scale. Multi-Ethnic Acculturation Scale and English proficiency, measured with a self-rated scale, were associated with the four respective. No interpreters were used. Results: While members from EM significantly differed from members of the Ethnic majority groupin traditional neuropsychological tasks, their performance on the VSTMBT yielded results comparable to those drawn from theEthnic majority group . Complex influences seem to drive the sensitivity of traditional neuropsychological tasks to sociocultural factors. Conclusion: This is the first study that subjects the VSTMBT to investigation in EM groups. Older adults from EMs showed no impact of their sociocultural backgrounds on the function assessed by this test. However, other tests widely used for the assessment of EM populations proved sensitive to the investigated sociocultural factors. Our results lend support to the suggestion that neuropsychological assessments must abandon the one-size-fits-all notion when it comes to dementia risk detection among EM groups.

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