ABSTRACT
Why cognitive screening? With a rapidly growing elderly population comes the ‘demographic imperative’ that neuropsychiatric disorders will become one of the major clinical and public health challenges of the next generation. The dementias and neuropsychiatric disorders in this population, as well as in younger patients, represents a challenge for which we are still largely unprepared. While many of these conditions are not reversible, secondary and tertiary prevention are realistic and important goals for health-care systems around the world. Prevention involves early diagnosis and treatment, but also disability limitation and the prevention of complications resulting from those disorders (Ganguli, 1997). Ganguli rightly makes the point that ‘No cognitive screening measure is an Alzheimer’s test;. While non-professionals can generally perform screening, those who test positive need to be targeted for more skilled and detailed assessments. Although screening represents only the first step in a process of assessment and ‘work-up’, it still offers the best opportunity for secondary prevention (Ganguli, 1997).
