Validating the Cognitive Scale for Down Syndrome (CS-DS) to Detect Longitudinal Cognitive Decline in Adults With Down Syndrome

Discussion We assessed the longitudinal change in CS-DS scores in adults with DS aged 36 years and over across two time points, ~1.5–2 years apart. Total scores showed a significant decrease over this time, with scores in the executive function domain also showing a significant decrease and scores in the memory domain trending to a significant decrease. Change in total scores trended to be significantly greater in those with noticeable cognitive decline compared to those without noticeable cognitive decline at the second time point, with scores in the executive function domain only showing a significantly greater change in those with noticeable cognitive decline. Change in CS-DS total scores showed significant correlations with change in scores for informant measures of adaptive abilities and symptoms associated with cognitive decline, in addition to a participant measure of cognitive abilities. Finally, we found that change in score for the CS-DS memory domain better predicted change in participant cognitive abilities compared to the executive function or language domains. Our results provide further support for the validity of the CS-DS as a tool to assess everyday cognitive abilities and associated decline in people with DS. We previously showed that CS-DS scores were lower for individuals with noticeable cognitive decline compared to those without noticeable cognitive decline (13). We have now extended this finding to show that the CS-DS is sensitive to ...
Source: Frontiers in Psychiatry - Category: Psychiatry Source Type: research