AUTHOR=Gorny Iris , Krause Kristina , Albert Anita , Schneider Sabrina , Möller Leona , Habermehl Lena , Strzelczyk Adam , Rosenow Felix , Hermsen Anke , Knake Susanne , Menzler Katja 

TITLE=Limitations of a Short Demographic Questionnaire for Bedside Estimation of Patients’ Global Cognitive Functioning in Epilepsy Patients

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Neurology

VOLUME=9

YEAR=2018

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/neurology/articles/10.3389/fneur.2018.00085

DOI=10.3389/fneur.2018.00085

ISSN=1664-2295

ABSTRACT=<sec id="ST1"><title>Objectives</title><p>The German socio-demographic estimation scale was developed by Jahn et al. (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">1</xref>) to quickly predict premorbid global cognitive functioning in patients. So far, it has been validated in healthy adults and has shown a good correlation with the full and verbal IQ of the Wechsler Adult Intelligence Scale (WAIS) in this group. However, there are no data regarding its use as a bedside test in epilepsy patients.</p></sec><sec id="ST2"><title>Methods</title><p>Forty native German speaking adult patients with refractory epilepsy were included. They completed a neuropsychological assessment, including a nine scale short form of the German version of the WAIS-III and the German socio-demographic estimation scale by Jahn et al. (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">1</xref>) during their presurgical diagnostic stay in our center. We calculated means, correlations, and the rate of concordance (range ±5 and ±7.5 IQ score points) between these two measures for the whole group, and a subsample of 19 patients with a global cognitive functioning level within 1 SD of the mean (IQ score range 85–115) and who had completed their formal education before epilepsy onset.</p></sec><sec id="ST3"><title>Results</title><p>The German demographic estimation scale by Jahn et al. (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">1</xref>) showed a significant mean overestimation of the global cognitive functioning level of eight points in the epilepsy patient sample compared with the short form WAIS-III score. The accuracy within a range of ±5 or ±7.5 IQ score points for each patient was similar to that of the healthy controls reported by Jahn et al. (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">1</xref>) in our subsample, but not in our whole sample.</p></sec><sec id="ST4"><title>Conclusion</title><p>Our results show that the socio-demographic scale by Jahn et al. (<xref ref-type="bibr" rid="B1">1</xref>) is not sufficiently reliable as an estimation tool of global cognitive functioning in epilepsy patients. It can be used to estimate global cognitive functioning in a subset of patients with a normal global cognitive functioning level who have completed their formal education before epilepsy onset, but it does not reliably predict global cognitive functioning in epilepsy patients in general, who often do not fulfill these criteria. It is therefore not a useful tool to be applied in the general neuropsychological presurgical evaluation of epilepsy patients.</p></sec>