Evaluating the efficiency of a five-minute cognitive test for the use in non-demented patients with cognitive declines (a pilot study)

Background: the Five-Minute Cognitive Test (FCT) was designed in 2019 by the Chinese scientists to capture deficits in five domains of cognitive abilities, including episodic memory, language fluency, time orientation, visuospatial function, and executive function. Aim: to evaluate the efficiency of the Russian FCT version for identifying cognitive impairments (CI) in non-demented patients. Patients and Methods: according to the international requirements and standards, the FCT was translated and adapted and then evaluated in a focus group of non-demented patients (n=62, 60–75 years old) followed by the assessment of its psychometric properties. The FCT results were compared with the MMSE and Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MOCA) scores in two patient groups: the treatment group (n=30) consisting of patients with moderate CI, before after the cognitive rehabilitation course, and the comparison group, consisting of 32 individuals with normal cognitive functions. In addition, the correlation of the hippocampal volume with FCT/MMSE scores was assessed. Results: the average time to complete FCT was 5–6 min. The sensitivity and specificity of PCT for CI screening was 80.6% and 84.11%, respectively. As demonstrated by the study findings, FCT’s diagnostic performance was not inferior to that of other tests used for detecting CI. The neurovisualization data showed that there was a positive correlation between the hippocampal volume and the FCT/MMSE scores. Conclusion: the preliminary results suggest that the Russian FCT version is acceptable and promising for the use in clinical practice as a relevant screening test for identifying CI. KEYWORDS: mild cognitive impairments, moderate cognitive impairments, Alzheimer’s disease, brief cognitive test. FOR CITATION: Tuzhikov K.P., Voitenkov V.B., Ekusheva E.V. Evaluating the efficiency of a five-minute cognitive test for the use in non- demented patients with cognitive declines (a pilot study). Russian Medical Inquiry. 2022;6(10):551–555 (in Russ.). DOI: 10.32364/2587- 6821-2022-6-10-551-555