Neurological diagnostic tests for patients with and without delirium: a prospective observational study.

Waefler, Noémie; Abid, Imen; Montaut, Victor; Donzé, Jacques; Zender, Hervé; John, Gregor (2024). Neurological diagnostic tests for patients with and without delirium: a prospective observational study. (In Press). GeroScience Springer 10.1007/s11357-024-01246-5

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Since most of the precipitating factors of delirium are not due to neurological disorders, neurological diagnostic tests (NDTs) may be of limited value. We hypothesized that delirium has a high burden of NDTs with a low diagnostic yield. All patients admitted to the internal medicine wards of a single secondary teaching hospital between November 2019 and January 2020 were eligible. Within the first 48 h of their admission, they had a formal evaluation by a neuropsychologist to screen for presence of delirium. NDTs (brain MRI, brain CT, electroencephalography (EEG), and lumbar puncture) performed during the hospital stay were compared between patients with and without delirium using a logistic regression model stratified by a propensity score. The proportions of diagnostic yield (acute anomalies that changed the treatment management) provided by each type of examination were compared. Of 217 patients included, 19/32 patients (61%) with delirium had one or more NDTs, compared to 48/185 (26%) without delirium (adjusted OR 2.7; 95%CI 1.1-6.7; p = 0.027). The proportions of NDT results affecting management for patients with and without delirium were 13 and 20% for brain CT scans (p = 0.71), 29 and 38% for brain MRI (p = 0.99), and 20 and 10% for EEGs (p = 0.99), respectively. The higher proportion of NDTs performed on patients with delirium was associated with a low diagnostic yield, although not statistically different from those performed among inpatients without delirium. There is a need for restrictive, evidence-based guidelines to help with the work-up for patients with delirium.

Item Type:

Journal Article (Original Article)

Division/Institute:

04 Faculty of Medicine > Department of General Internal Medicine (DAIM) > Clinic of General Internal Medicine

UniBE Contributor:

Donzé, Jacques

Subjects:

600 Technology > 610 Medicine & health

ISSN:

2509-2723

Publisher:

Springer

Language:

English

Submitter:

Pubmed Import

Date Deposited:

26 Jun 2024 14:30

Last Modified:

26 Jun 2024 14:39

Publisher DOI:

10.1007/s11357-024-01246-5

PubMed ID:

38916662

Uncontrolled Keywords:

CT scan Delirium Electroencephalography Lumbar puncture MRI

BORIS DOI:

10.48350/198104

URI:

https://boris.unibe.ch/id/eprint/198104

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