Mild cognitive impairment: early detection and new perspectives

Introduction. Along past years, interest in mild cognitive impairment (MCI) research and its early detection has been increased. Unlike first theories, international current proposals suggest that MCI is a syndrome characterized by an impairment in one or more cognitive functions without interfering in daily functional abilities and it is also accompanied by a concern because of the cognitive change. Although early MCI detection is usually made by cognitive screening tests, most of them do not seem to correctly detect MCI, but dementia. Aim. To expose an analysis of the cognitive screening tests more suitable for clinical MCI detection, according to current researches. Development and conclusions. There are three kind of cognitive screening tests: general cognitive screening tests, specific cognitive screening tests and MCI-subtype cognitive screening test. We observe that most of the tests don't follow current MCI criteria. In this respect we propose to jointly apply tests, as well as the necessity of a carefully test choice to effectively detect MCI in clinical practice.