Flicker 1997.
| Study characteristics | |||
| Patient Sampling | Participants were consecutive patients seen at the memory clinic who had complete data available and 100 patients randomly selected who had been reviewed by the aged‐care assessment team (ACAT) who consented to participate | ||
| Patient characteristics and setting | Included participants came from 2 sources: those referred to the memory clinic in a hospital in Melbourne, Australia and those referred to the ACAT over a 6‐month period | ||
| Index tests | IQCODE 26 item, English language | ||
| Target condition and reference standard(s) | Clinical dementia diagnosis using DSM‐III‐R | ||
| Flow and timing | Of 437 possible consecutive memory‐clinic participants, 299 were included on grounds of complete available data and where the assessments could be made in English, without involving translation services. From 100 possible ACAT patients, 78 were included based on willingness to consent in assessments and informant interviews It is not clear if the results of the index test informed the conclusions of the assessments to form a clinical diagnosis (reference standard) |
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| Comparative | |||
| Notes | |||
| Methodological quality | |||
| Item | Authors' judgement | Risk of bias | Applicability concerns |
| DOMAIN 1: Patient Selection | |||
| Was a consecutive or random sample of patients enrolled? | Yes | ||
| Was a case‐control design avoided? | Yes | ||
| Did the study avoid inappropriate exclusions? | No | ||
| Could the selection of patients have introduced bias? | High risk | ||
| Are there concerns that the included patients and setting do not match the review question? | Low concern | ||
| DOMAIN 3: Reference Standard | |||
| Is the reference standards likely to correctly classify the target condition? | Yes | ||
| Could the reference standard, its conduct, or its interpretation have introduced bias? | High risk | ||
| Are there concerns that the target condition as defined by the reference standard does not match the question? | Low concern | ||
| DOMAIN 4: Flow and Timing | |||
| Was there an appropriate interval between index test and reference standard? | Yes | ||
| Were all patients included in the analysis? | Unclear | ||
| Could the patient flow have introduced bias? | Unclear risk | ||