Comparison of two brief neuropsychological batteries in people with multiple sclerosis

We compared two brief neuropsychological batteries devised to assess people with multiple sclerosis (MS) and used them to assess the relationship between cognitive impairment and clinical characteristics. Methods. We administered either the Brief Repeatable Battery of Neuropsychological Tests (BUNT) or the Screening Examination for Cognitive Impairment (SEFCI) to 213 consecutive MS outpatients and 213 individually matched controls. Results: Administration times were longer for BRBNT than SEFCI, for MS and controls (p=0.001), People with MS had lower scores in all individual tests than controls (p<0.001, BUNT and SEFCI). By the criterion of poor performance on one or more tests, the sensitivity of BUNT was 41.9% and that of SEFCI 31.5%. The corresponding figures by poor performance on two or more tests were 16.2% for BRBNT and 18.5% for SEFCI. The Buschke Selective Reminding and Paced Auditory Serial Addition were the tests best discriminating between people with MS and controls for BRBNT, and the Symbol Digit Modalities test for SEFCI. The only clinical variable independently associated with impaired performance on these batteries was EDSS. Conclusions: Both cognitive batteries were well accepted and easy to administer. Administration time for SEFCI was significantly shorter than for BRBNT, however, alternative forms for serial evaluation are available only for BRBNT, The BRBNT was slightly more sensitive in detecting impairment by the criterion of poor performance on one or more tests. EDSS score was the only clinical variable independently associated with cognitive impairment.