The usefulness of the SLUMS test for diagnosis of mild cognitive impairment and dementia

Aim. To compare Polish version of the The Saint Louis University Mental Status Examination test (SLUMS) to generally used psychometric screening tools for detecting mild cognitive impairment and dementia. Methods. The total number of 58 nursing home residents were divided into 3 groups: 1) people showing no symptoms of dementia, 2) people with mild cognitive impairment and 3) people with suspected dementia. The Saint Louis University Mental Status Examination (SLUMS), Mini Mental State Examination (MMSE), Short Test of Mental State (STMS) and Test Your Memory (TYM) were administered for comparison. Results. Mean age was 81.7 ± 8.62. Regarding the education, 37.9% of the sample was educated at the primary school level, 31% completed high school and 22.4 % had higher education. The SLUMS internal consistency was 0.7031. The mean of total SLUMS score was 23.3 in no demented residents, 19.3 among those identified as having cognitive impairments and 13.1 residents with suspected dementia. The statistical analysis illustrated that SLUMS differentiate the dementia residents from those considered as having cognitive impairment (p = 0.01), as well as from non demented participants (p = 0.0001). Moreover, it seems to be useful for detecting mild cognitive impairment in non demented participants (p=0.017), while MMSE does not offer such a possibility (p = 0.51). Conclusions. The SLUMS is not just another screening tool that can complement the range of existing cognitive tests in Polish clinical practice, but according to statistical analysis it demonstrates superior capabilities in the screening diagnosis compared to the most famous scale used in Poland – MMSE.