Investigation of neuropsychological markers for dementia 1
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Investigation of neuropsychological markers for the diagnosis of dementia in routine practice
IRAS ID
237041
Contact name
Laura Bell
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
NTW NHS Foundation Trust
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 3 months, 9 days
Research summary
The increase of people developing dementia presents a huge challenge to society, both now and increasingly in the future. Within the UK, it is reported that there is approximately 700,000 people who have dementia; 570,000 of which live in England. According to David Cameron’s ‘Prime Minister’s challenge on Dementia 2020’ (Department of Health, 2015), if dementia is diagnosed in a timely way, this enables the individual and their family carers to make their own decisions to manage the impact of the individual’s condition, through accessing information, support and a broad range of treatments such as: social, psychological and pharmacological.
Neuropsychological testing is a key aspect of clinical assessments of dementia, and a range of valid and reliable tests of the above mentioned brain functions are utilised as part of the diagnostic process. Alongside these tests, patients undergo a number of physical investigations, including brain scans and blood tests. There has been very little consensus in the literature regarding the specificity and sensitivity of neuropsychological tests in identifying particular types of dementia. If it were possible to identify more accurate markers of dementia, it would help clinicians with the diagnostic process and possibly limit the number of physical investigations that patients have to endure. Therefore, this study will investigate whether people with a dementia have a differential performance on specific neuropsychological tests, compared with people without a dementia’. The data will only include neuropsychological tests completed as routine care for all referrals to the Northumberland Memory Service.
In addition, research has found a link between cognitive decline and hearing loss (Lin et al, 2011)but that treated hearing loss reduces the rate of cognitive decline (Amieva et al, 2015. Therefore, it would be interesting to assess whether untreated hearing loss as a marker is associated with a greater risk of dementia.REC name
North West - Greater Manchester Central Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
18/NW/0197
Date of REC Opinion
6 Apr 2018
REC opinion
Further Information Favourable Opinion