Agitation in Alzheimer’s disease: From assessment to therapeutics

Table 3 Clinical assessment tools for agitation in older adults with Alzheimer’s disease

Assessment tool	Dimensions evaluated	Application stage	Strengths	Limitations
NPI	Multiple behavioral and psychological domains, including apathy, anxiety, agitation/aggression, dysphoria/depression, delusions, hallucinations, among others	Different stages of AD	Broad coverage of symptoms; flexibility: Multiple versions suitable for different applications; available for rapid screening (NPI-Q) in busy clinical settings	Limited assessment of different agitation-related behaviors; the original version (NPI) is time-consuming
BEHAVE-AD	Multiple behavioral and psychological domains, including paranoid/delusional ideation, hallucination, activity disturbances, aggressiveness, among others	Different stages of AD, but better suitable for later ones (domains selected to reflect behaviors likely to respond to medications)	Broad coverage of symptoms	Less detailed than agitation-specific tools; less practical in time-constrained settings
CMAI	Different physical and verbal, aggressive and non-aggressive behaviors	Advanced stages of AD (developed to assess behaviors of older adults living in nursing homes)	Comprehensive characterization of agitation-related behaviors	Narrower scope; does not cover other behavioral and psychological symptoms

NPI: Neuropsychiatric Inventory; NPI-Q: Neuropsychiatric Inventory Questionnaire; BEHAVE-AD: Behavioral pathology in Alzheimer’s disease Rating Scale; CMAI: Cohen-Mansfield Agitation Inventory; AD: Alzheimer’s disease.