Diagnosing Alzheimer Disease: Which Dementia Screening Tool to Use in Elderly Puerto Ricans with Mild Cognitive Impairment and Early Alzheimer Disease?

Most of the time, Alzheimer Disease (AD)’s diagnosis is not made at its earliest periods and prodromal stages, for instance at Mild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) and Early Alzheimer Disease (E‐AD) stage. Commonly, AD’s diagnosis is made when significant impairment interferes with the habitual daily activities (1). Our pilot study, serves to demonstrate a correlation between the screening tools, including the Mini‐mental Status Exam (MMSE), Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) and Clinical Dementia Rating Scale (CDR), and the biological biomarkers in the cerebral spinal fluid (CSF) (Amyloid Beta 1‐42 (Aβ42 pg/mL), Tau proteins (tTau (pg/mL) and tTau/Aβ42 ratio in Puerto Ricans > 55 years old with MCI and E‐AD. To our knowledge, this is the first study trying to create a correlation between memory tests scores and underlying AD pathology to improve early detection in elderly Puerto Ricans.