ABSTRACT
This chapter reviews key considerations in the assessment of dementia in Latino Americans, with a focus on neuropsychological, functional status, and behavioral and neuropsychiatric symptom assessment. The chapter begins by reviewing the strengths and limitations of the use of interpreters, with associated recommendations for best practices in assessing monolingual and bilingual Spanish speaking patients. Next, the application of existing English language neuropsychological measures and translated/adapted versions of these measures among Latino Americans is critically reviewed, followed by a discussion of the impact of bilingualism on neuropsychological assessment. The chapter provides case examples from a bilingual specialty clinic to illustrate how bilingualism can both be formally measured and influence neuropsychological test scores, and to provide recommendations for best practice. It then reviews the assessment of both functional status (i.e., activities of daily living and instrumental activities of daily living) among Latino Americans with dementia, addressing both self- and informant-report and performance-based measures, and behavioral and neuropsychiatric symptoms, including depression and apathy. The chapter concludes with a summary of recommendations for clinical practice, including suggestions for the most appropriate strategies and specific measures for use in the assessment of dementia among monolingual and bilingual Spanish-speaking Latino Americans.
