title: The 'preliminary neuropsychological battery'. An instrument to grade the cognitive level of minimally responsive patients.
abstract: An early, formalized cognitive evaluation of'minimally responsive' patients could be important in the planning of their care and rehabilitation as well as in providing a realistic prognosis and studying the modality of the cognitive recovery. A short, bedside, neuropsychologically-oriented test-battery, the Preliminary Neuropsychological Battery, a psychometric tool which enables the cognitive evaluation of these patients and of patients unable to give verbal or complex motor answers, has been devised. The BNP was administered to a sample of 40 head-injured patients and to a sample of 34 healthy subjects. The aim was (i) to evaluate its usefulness, and (ii) to study its correlation with cortical functions as assessed by a more extensive battery. The findings suggest that the BNP is useful for assessing the general cognitive level of head-injured post-comatose patients. It was able to detect patients deserving a wider, analytic, neuropsychological assessment. Attentional defects emerged as an important variable determining the BNP score.
authors.affiliation: Department of Neurology, Neuropsychology Unit, 'Salvatore Maugeri' Foundation (IRCCS), Rehabilitation Institute of Veruno, Italy. fcossa@fsm.it
authors.forename: F M
authors.initials: FM
authors.lastname: Cossa
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Fabiani
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Farinato
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Laiacona
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Capitani
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001288:Attention / Q000502:physiology; D001930:Brain Injuries / Q000523:psychology*; D003071:Cognition / Q000502:physiology*; D005260:Female; D007839:Functional Laterality / Q000502:physiology; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests; D010775:Photic Stimulation