Differential diagnosis of dementia: intra- and interdiscipline agreement

Ninety clinicians from six disciplines diagnosed ten case descriptions of patients, judged by a multidisciplinary expert committee to suffer from dementia. Five cases were diagnosed before and five after a consensus meeting on the diagnosis of dementia. A significant change in the level of agreement between the disciplines could not be established. The analysis did show a significant difference between the disciplines in the use of etiologic diagnoses. The results indicated that, in order to avoid possible bias caused by medical specialization, a multidisciplinary approach for this type of patient is recommended.