Validation of an Ultrashort Screening Tool for Specific Learning Disorder Among School-Going Children

Specific learning disorder (SLD) is a neurodevelopmental disorder characterized by impairment in reading, written expression, and arithmetic. It can be identified during early school days itself. There is a lack of a screening tool for SLD that is properly validated and easy to administer. This study is an attempt to validate an ultrashort tool for screening SLD.

This cross-sectional study was done at Government Medical College Ernakulam, South India. Children aged 6-16 years attending Psychiatry Outpatient Department were recruited by consecutive sampling. The self-administered screening tool, known as Ernakulam Learning Disorder (ELD) tool, was given twice within a gap of 2 months, and the results were compared with the clinical diagnosis, which was taken as the gold standard. The sensitivity, specificity, positive predictive value, negative predictive value, and kappa of the screening tool were calculated.

The sample consisted of children aged 8-16 years. The sensitivity and specificity of the tool were found to be 98.2 (95% confidence interval [CI] = 90.4-100) and 87.5 (CI = 76.8-94.4), respectively. The positive predictive value was 87.3 (CI = 76.5-94.4) and the negative predictive value was 98.2 (CI = 90.6-100). The kappa value was 0.96 (CI = 0.92-1.01).

ELD tool seems highly useful as a screening instrument for detecting SLD; it is simple, easy to remember, and easy to administer.