[Detection of dementia and depression using the Brief Assessment Interview (BAI): results of a reliability and validity study with residents of a nursing home in Mannheim].

Described here is the German version of the Brief Assessment Interview (BAI), an instrument developed originally in the course of the US-UK cross-national studies and designed to compile data on dementia and depression among the elderly. A study in Mannheim, FRG, of residents in an old people's home tested the reliability and validity of the BAI. Raters corresponded to a high degree on both the dementia and depression scales; intraclass coefficients (ICC) amounted to 0.95 and 0.97, respectively. Compared to the interrater reliability, test-retest reliability was somewhat lower (dementia scale: 0.83, depression scale; 0.74), but always significant at the 1% level. The internal consistency of the dementia scale lay between 0.62 and 0.77, and that of the depression scale between 0.78 and 0.92. In evaluating the validity of BAI, results of the dementia and depression scales were compared to the corresponding diagnoses. These independent diagnoses had been made with the aid of the Feighner criteria by the director of the facility, who had special training in psychiatry. The diagnoses yielded a significant relationship (p less than 0.01) between the dementia (r = 0.49) and depression scales (r = 0.60). The BAI also attained sufficiently high values for sensitivity, specificity, and total efficiency. It is, therefore, well suited for use in elderly target groups that are otherwise difficult to assess, and it also affords a high degree of international comparability.