Concurrent validity of the neurobehavioral cognitive status exam subtests

The Neurobehavioral Cognitive Status Exam (NCSE) is a screening measure that assesses numerous neuropsychological (NP) domains. Fifty-four patients completed the NCSE and common NP tests assessing similar abilities. Most subtest screens (brief items that determine whether additional testing should occur) exhibited low false negative rates, but high false positive rates, based upon performance on the follow-up metric items. Each subtest was significantly correlated with the associated NP test. However, using performance on the NP test as the 'gold standard', the NCSE subtests classified impaired and unimpaired patients at a much lower than expected rate. The latter results draw into question the efficacy of the NCSE subtests in delineating domain-specific cognitive functioning.