Centre for Policy on Ageing



Diagnosing dementia in a developing nation — an evaluation of the GMS-AGECAT algorithm in an older Korean population
Author(s)	Jae-Min Kim, Robert Stewart, Martin Prince
Journal title	International Journal of Geriatric Psychiatry, vol 18, no 4, April 2003
Pages	pp 331-336
Keywords	Dementia ; Diagnosis ; Evaluation ; Screening ; Korea.
Annotation	Of 746 people aged 65+ in Kwuangiu, South Korea participating in this evaluation regarding suitability of the Geriatric Mental Scale (GMS; with diagnosis assigned through AGECAT) for developing countries, GMS organic disorder was diagnosed in 262 (35%) and DSM-IV dementia in 110 (15%). Increased age, female gender and lower education independently predicted disagreement between the two diagnoses. In these groups, sensitivity to a clinical diagnosis of dementia remained high but specificity was markedly reduced. Thus, dementia may be overestimated in developing countries if the GMS-AGECAT diagnosis of organic disorder is used alone. The validity of other diagnoses, such as affective disorder, may also be affected if the hierarchical diagnostic algorithm is used(i.e. where the diagnosis of organic disorder affects the likelihood of other diagnoses). (RH).
Accession Number	CPA-030515210 A
Classmark	EA: LK7: 4C: 3V: 7DK
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...from the Ageinfo database published by Centre for Policy on Ageing.