The Montreal Cognitive Assessment: Creating a Crosswalk with the Mini-Mental State Examination.

OBJECTIVES: To establish Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) scores that correspond to well-established cut-points on the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE). DESIGN: Cross-sectional observational study. SETTING: General medical service of a large teaching hospital. PARTICIPANTS: Individuals aged 75 and older (N = 199; mean age 84, 63% female). MEASUREMENTS: The MoCA (range 0-30) and the MMSE (range 0-30) were administered within 2 hours of each other. The Abbreviated MoCA (A-MoCA; range 0-22) was calculated from the full MoCA. Scores from the three tests were analyzed using equipercentile equating, a statistical method for determining comparable scores on different tests of a similar construct by estimating percentile equivalents. RESULTS: MoCA scores were lower (mean 19.3 ± 5.8) than MMSE scored (mean 24.1 ± 6.6). Traditional MMSE cut-points of 27 for mild cognitive impairment and 23 for dementia corresponded to MoCA scores of 23 and 17, respectively. CONCLUSION: Scores on the full and abbreviated versions of the MoCA can be linked directly to the MMSE. The MoCA may be more sensitive to changes in cognitive performance at higher levels of functioning.

Sleep characteristics as predictor variables of stress systems markers in insomnia disorder.

This study investigates the extent to which sleep characteristics serve as predictor variables for inflammatory, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal and autonomic systems markers. Twenty-nine participants with a diagnosis of insomnia disorder based on the Diagnostic Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fifth Edition (age 25.3 ± 1.6 years, insomnia duration 6.6 ± 0.8 years) and 19 healthy control sleepers (age 25.4 ± 1.4 years) underwent a 2-week at-home evaluation keeping a sleep diary and wearing an actigraph, followed by a visit to the Research Center to measure blood pressure, and collect blood and urine samples. The actigraphy- and diary-based variables of sleep duration, sleep-onset latency, wake after sleep onset and sleep fragmentation/number of night-time awakenings were averaged and entered as dependent variables in regression analyses. Composite scores were calculated for the autonomic (blood pressure, norepinephrine), inflammatory (monocyte counts, interleukin-6, C-reactive protein) and hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal systems (cortisol), and used as predictor variables in regression models. Compared with controls, individuals with insomnia had a shorter sleep duration (P < 0.05), and a higher hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal and inflammatory composite score (P < 0.05). The higher inflammatory score was mainly due to higher circulating monocytes (P < 0.05), rather than differences in interleukin-6 or C-reactive protein. In persistent insomnia disorder, cortisol is upregulated and associated with actigraphy- and diary-based wake after sleep onset, suggesting that wake after sleep onset may serve as a marker to identify individuals at increased risks for disorders associated with a hyperactive hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal system. The absence of autonomic and pro-inflammatory changes (interleukin-6, C-reactive protein), despite a substantial decrease in actigraphic sleep duration, may relate to a higher resilience to the adverse biological consequences of insomnia in this young age group.