Screening for Alzheimer's disease: Strength in numbers

Choosing the right test to screen for neurocognitive disorders in clinical practice is challenging. A recent paper by Kazuo Kitagawa and colleagues studied combining the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) to predict the risk of conversion to dementia during follow-up of patents at high vascular risk. Patients with pathological scores on both tests had a much higher risk of developing dementia than those with only one pathological test. Here, we discuss the study's strengths and limitations and highlight the importance of early screening for dementia to better detect patients who could benefit from specialized care.