The MCI Screen is a brief neuropsychological test

Neuropsychological test

Neuropsychological tests are specifically designed tasks used to measure a psychological function known to be linked to a particular brain structure or pathway. Tests are used for research into brain function and in a clinical setting for the diagnosis of deficits. They usually involve the...

 derived from the protocol of the CERAD 10-word recall test. The protocol consists of an immediate recall task, a triadic comparison task, a judgment task, a delayed free recall task, a cued-recall task, and a rehearsed recall task. It is scored using correspondence analysis

Correspondence analysis

Correspondence analysis is a multivariate statistical technique proposed by Hirschfeld and later developed by Jean-Paul Benzécri. It is conceptually similar to principal component analysis, but applies to categorical rather than continuous data...

 and sophisticated statistical methods that yield high accuracy for differentiating normal cognitive function from Mild cognitive impairment

Mild cognitive impairment

Mild cognitive impairment is a brain-function syndrome involving the onset and evolution of cognitive impairments beyond those expected based on the age and education of the individual, but which are not significant enough to interfere with their daily activities...

. The methodology for scoring the MCI Screen was developed by Medical Care Corporation, a privately held California Corporation.

Validation

The MCI Screen was validated in a study on 471 community dwelling adults whose scores on the Clinical Dementia Rating Scale ranged from 0 (normal: N=119), 0.5 (mild cognitive impairment: N=95), to 1 (mild dementia: N=257). According to a 2005 publication in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the MCI Screen has overall accuracy of 98% with sensitivity of 97% for mild cognitive impairment or mild dementia, and 88% specificity for normal aging. Clinical studies in the USA have shown that the MCI Screen detects early-stage, memory loss due to multiple underlying medical conditions including Alzheimer's disease

Alzheimer's disease

Alzheimer's disease also known in medical literature as Alzheimer disease is the most common form of dementia. There is no cure for the disease, which worsens as it progresses, and eventually leads to death...

, cerebrovascular disease, and others. Japan based studies have demonstrated cross-cultural validity of the MCI Screen in clinical and academic settings with accuracy levels equal to those in the USA.