Montreal Cognitive Assessment for Dementia Severity Staging: Practical Cutoffs
for Clinical Use
 
   Lead Investigator:    Peter Stewart
   Institution      :    Geisinger Health System
   E-Mail           :    pstewart1@geisinger.edu
   Proposal ID      :    1262



   Proposal Description:
   Properly caring for patients with neurodegenerative disorders requires accurately determining the stage of their illness. Dementia severity staging is also important for patient stratification in clinical trials and other research endeavors. Gold standard measures of dementia severity such as the Clinical Dementia Rating require a high level of training and are prohibitively time consuming in many clinical settings. For this reason, brief mental status examinations have been used extensively to stage dementia severity in clinical practice. The Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) is a relatively new mental status examination that boasts enhanced sensitivity to mild cognitive impairment and a more complete sampling of cognitive abilities. Despite its widespread clinical use, there are currently no published guidelines for dementia severity staging with the MoCA. The principle aim of this project is to determine optimal cut points that can be used to rapidly stage dementia with the MoCA, thereby leading to more accurate clinical decision making and ultimately, better patient care.