Psychometric properties of Ain Shams University Behavioral Assessment tool (ASUB) in senior patients with dementia

Abstract

Background: Neuropsychiatric symptoms (psychotic, behavioral and mood) are very common in dementia patients. They are major source of excess disability, patient distress and caregiver burden, thus appropriate assessment and quantification of these symptoms in elderly demented patients is mandated. Aim of the Work: To assess the reliability of Ain shams university behavioral assessment tool in the diagnosis of neuropsychiatric symptoms in dementia compared to Behavior Rating Scale for Dementia of the Consortium to Establish a Registry for Alzheimer's disease CERAD-BRSD. Methods: An observational cross sectional study was conducted on 70 elderly demented patients aged 60 years and above and their primary caregivers. All patients underwent a comprehensive geriatric assessment. Results: The recruited sample included 15 cases with mild dementia, 42 with moderate dementia and 13 with severe dementia. 17.1%of the cases had stroke, 8.5 % had Parkinsonism, 28.6% had Hypertension and18.6% had ischemic heart disease. 92.9%of the studied persons were negative for depression as assessed by Cornell scale. 48.6% of the cases were assisted in ADL and 45.7 were dependent. Regarding IADL, 75.7% of the cases were dependent and 18.6 % were assisted. The most prevalent neuropsychiatric symptoms in our study were agitation, anxiety and mood disturbance. They were more common in moderate dementia. Delusions and hallucination were more prevalent among mild and moderate dementia. The internal consistency for ASUB was 0.813 and for CERAD-BRSD was 0.865. Conclusions: ASUB is a new Arabic tool that is reliable for the assessment of neuropsychiatric symptoms of dementia.