12-item version of Boston Naming Test: usefulness in the diagnosis of primary progressive aphasia, frontotemporal dementia, and Alzheimer's disease.

UNLABELLED

The 12-item version of the Boston Naming Test (BNT) was adapted to Argentina for the detection of dementia due to Alzheimer's disease (AD), with scores similar to the original 60-item version (sensitivity and specificity of 85 and 94%, respectively) without demographic influence (age and educational level). To date, no publications on the use of abbreviated BNT in other degenerative pathologies with language impairment have been reported.

OBJECTIVE

The objective of this study was to evaluate the usefulness of 12-item BNT in primary progressive aphasia (PPA), the behavioral variant of frontotemporal dementia (FTDbv), and AD.

METHODS

Notably, 47 patients with probable AD (NIA-AA 2011) - clinical dementia rating (CDR) 0.5-1, 55 with FTDbv, 17 with PPA, and 46 controls were evaluated and matched for age and education. Exclusion criteria were as follows: alcoholism, other previous neurological or psychiatric illnesses, and education <4 years. All were assessed with a full neuropsychological battery and a 12-item version of BNT.

RESULTS

Median scores of 12-item BNT were as follows: PPA: 3.87 (SD=2.99), AD: 6.13 (SD=3.03); FTDbv: 8.41 (SD=2.53); and controls: 10.22 (SD=1.82). Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curves were plotted.

CONCLUSIONS

The 12-item version of BNT can be useful, simple, and fast to identify and differentiate PPA, FTDbv, and AD from controls while retaining the discriminative ability of the original version.