Validation of a digit symbol substitution test for use in supervised and unsupervised assessment in mild Alzheimer's disease.
J Clin Exp Neuropsychol
; 44(10): 768-779, 2022 12.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-36888758
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION:
The Digit-Symbol-Substitution Test (DSST) is used widely in neuropsychological investigations of Alzheimer's Disease (AD). A computerized version of this paradigm, the DSST-Meds, utilizes medicine-date pairings and has been developed for administration in both supervised and unsupervised environments. This study determined the utility and validity of the DSST-Meds for measuring cognitive dysfunction in early AD.METHOD:
Performance on the DSST-Meds was compared to performance on the WAIS Coding test, and a computerized digit symbol coding test (DSST-Symbols). The first study compared supervised performance on the three DSSTs versions in cognitively unimpaired (CU) adults (n = 104). The second compared supervised DSST performance between CU (n = 60) and mild-symptomatic AD (mild-AD, n = 79) groups. The third study compared performance on the DSST-Meds between unsupervised (n= 621) and supervised settings.RESULTS:
In Study 1, DSST-Meds accuracy showed high correlations with the DSST-Symbols accuracy (r = 0.81) and WAIS-Coding accuracy (r = 0.68). In Study 2, when compared to CU adults, the mild-AD group showed lower accuracy on all three DSSTs (Cohen's d ranging between 1.39 and 2.56) and DSST-Meds accuracy was correlated moderately with Mini-Mental State Examination scores (r = 0.44, p < .001). Study 3 observed no difference in DSST-meds accuracy between supervised and unsupervised administrations.CONCLUSION:
The DSST-Meds showed good construct and criterion validity when used in both supervised and unsupervised contexts and provided a strong foundation to investigate the utility of the DSST in groups with low familiarity to neuropsychological assessment.Key words
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Alzheimer Disease
/
Cognitive Dysfunction
Type of study:
Diagnostic_studies
/
Etiology_studies
Limits:
Adult
/
Humans
Language:
En
Journal:
J Clin Exp Neuropsychol
Journal subject:
NEUROLOGIA
/
PSICOLOGIA
Year:
2022
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
Australia