Neuropsychological normative standards for late career physicians

Area of Science:

• Neuropsychology
• Geriatrics
• Medical Education

Background:

• The physician workforce is aging, necessitating cognitive evaluations for late-career practitioners.
• Existing normative data may not accurately reflect the cognitive profiles of highly educated, aging physicians.

Purpose of the Study:

• To establish a specialized neuropsychological normative dataset for evaluating late-career physicians.
• To develop the HEATS (highly educated aging treaters) norms for cognitive assessment in this demographic.

Main Methods:

• Recruited 100 physicians aged 60-78 from three North Carolina medical centers.
• Administered a comprehensive neuropsychological test battery covering multiple neurocognitive domains.
• Collected data stratified by age and sex, developing regression formulas for enhanced predictive precision.

Main Results:

• Presented normative data in percentile bands, stratified by age and sex.
• Confirmed significant distinctions between the physician sample, the general population, and existing comparative norms.
• Demonstrated the utility of co-norming within a specialized sample for cognitive characterization.

Conclusions:

• Introduced the preliminary HEATS normative dataset for late-career physicians.
• These standards enable accurate, objective cognitive measurement for clinical and capacity evaluations.
• Future work will expand demographic applicability and explore links between cognitive standards and professional performance.