The Clinical Dementia Rating Sum of Boxes (CDR-SB) is a staging scale for Alzheimer’s disease (AD) and is commonly used as an outcome in clinical trials2. It relies on information provided by the patient and an informant3. The CDR-SB should reflect only the patient’s disease severity. However, we explored whether informant characteristics were associated with CDR-SB scores because that association might introduce bias in Alzheimer’s disease research. We found that the CDR-SB was 0.20 higher when informants were female, 0.39 higher when the informant was a patient’s child and 0.18 lower if the relationship was other than spouse or children. Regarding the frequency of contact, CDR-SB scores were 0.38 higher when contact was at least once a week, 0.65 higher when daily and 0.57 higher when living with the patient. Our analysis results suggest that informant characteristics can modify the CDR-SB scores and might introduce bias into Alzheimer’s disease trials and research.
Author(s):
Vargas-Gonzalez JC, Chadha AS, Castro-Aldrete L, Ferretti MT, Tartaglia MC
References including authors:
Vargas-Gonzalez JC, Chadha AS, Castro-Aldrete L, Ferretti MT, Tartaglia MC. Informant characteristics influence Clinical Dementia Rating Sum of Boxes scores-based staging of Alzheimer's disease. Nat Aging. 2024 Nov;4(11):1538-1543. doi: 10.1038/s43587-024-00732-x. Epub 2024 Oct 25. PMID: 39455890.