Research On The Application Of The Chinese Version Of GPCOG In Cognitive Screening For The Elderly In Community

Aims:To observe the value of Chinese version of GPCOG(the General Practitioner assessment of Cognition) in the cognitive screening for the elderly in community in China, and find a reliable, valid, efficient and acceptable instrument for cognitive screening for General Practices.Methods:All Respondents were examined by MMSE and GPCOG. Demographic data were collected and possible diagnoses were made by consensus DSM-IV diagnoses of dementia. The validity coefficients of the resulting brief scales (area under ROC curve, optimal cutpoint, sensitivity, specificity and Youden’index) were estimated from data collected in a previous validation of the GPCOG.Results:A total of297participants met the inclusion criteria and completed the survey. The Average age of them was71.43±9.80, and43of the297individuals(14.48%) were established possible diagnoses of dementia. This research showed that the incidence of dementia was significantly correlated with patient age and education,and there was no significant difference between males and females. In this research, the Cronbach’a of the Chinese version of GPCOG was0.775. Most of the correlation coefficientes between GPCOG-patient items and GPCOG-patient score lies between0.472and0.929(P<0.05), showed a Significant correlation, and the rest of them lies between0.298and0.503(P<0.05), which showed a Mild-to-Moderate correlation. The test-retest reliability of GPCOG-patient was0.9498(P=0.00). Data above proved that the Chinese version of GPCOG had a high reliability. It has been shown to be a valid instrument for detecting dementia with sensitivity and specificity of93.02%and84.65%. Pearson correlation coefficients with GPCOG and MMSE also showed a Significant correlation (r=0.761, P=0.000). Receiver operator characteristic(ROC) analyses were used to assess the GPCOG patient section,informant section,total score,and two stage test as screening tools for DSM-IV-defined dementia and The area under those curve(AUC) were calculated. The AUC of GPCOG-patient section was0.926(Sx-=0.017, P=0.000) and the AUC of GPCOG-informant section was0.933(Sx-=0.016, P=0.000), proved that the GPCOG has a high Validity. In addition, it was well-accepted by patients and general practices.Conclusions:The GPCOG is a valid, efficient, well-accepted instrument for dementia screening in primary care for General Practices.