Journal of neuropsychologySep 18, 2025

Testing the reliability and accuracy of the Frontal Assessment Battery for detecting memory-related mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease in Spanish patients

Alzheimers & Treatments Weekly Brief ↗PubMed ↗DOI ↗OA ↗

Updated Jan 19, 2026

Abstract

The Functional Assessment Battery (FAB) demonstrated good accuracy in distinguishing between healthy individuals and patients with mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer's disease, with an area under the curve (AUC) of 0.85.

FAB showed good internal consistency in Alzheimer's disease patients (α = .71) but not in those with single-domain amnestic mild cognitive impairment (α = .49).
Significant differences in total FAB scores were found between healthy individuals and both aMCI and AD groups.
An optimal cut-off score of 16.5 was identified for distinguishing healthy individuals from patients.
FAB's accuracy in differentiating between aMCI and AD patients was lower, with an AUC of 0.68.
Further research with larger samples is needed to confirm these findings.

Simplified

Dementia constitutes one of the most widespread neurological disorders, representing an important health concern due to its increasing prevalence. Among the various types of dementia, Alzheimer's disease (AD) is the most common in the elderly, characterized by episodic memory impairment and also a decline in executive functions. Mild cognitive impairment (MCI) is considered a transitional stage between normal ageing and dementia, often described as a pre-dementia state. Distinguishing between these states is of paramount importance for the detection and appropriate care of patients. Functional Assessment Battery (FAB) is a screening tool for assessing executive function. In this study, 36 healthy individuals (HC), 31 single-domain amnestic mild cognitive impairment (aMCI) patients, and 29 Alzheimer's disease (AD) patients were assessed using FAB to determine its reliability, validity, and discriminative validity in a Spanish sample. Results indicated a good internal consistency of FAB in the AD sample (α = .71), but not in the aMCI group (α = .49). Significant differences between HC and both aMCI and AD groups were observed in the total scores of FAB. The FAB also showed good accuracy in distinguishing between HC and patients (AUC = 0.85), with an estimated optimal cut-off point of 16.5. However, its ability to distinguish between aMCI and AD individuals was lower (AUC = 0.68). More studies are necessary to corroborate our results using larger samples.

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Funding

Competing interests

Authors declare no conflict of interest.

PubMed

Testing the reliability and accuracy of the Frontal Assessment Battery for detecting memory-related mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer's disease in Spanish patients

Abstract

Full Text

Funding

Competing interests

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