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Predictive Validity of the Neuropsychological Assessment Battery-Screening Module for Assessing Real-World Disability in Patients with Mild Traumatic Brain Injury

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Abstract

The present study set out to examine the ecological validity of the Neuropsychological Assessment Battery-Screening Module (NAB-S) and to examine more specifically, whether performance on this test battery is related to real-world disability status in patients who have sustained a mild traumatic brain injury (mTBI) as a consequence of a motor vehicle collision (MVC). Seventy-nine patients were recruited from a random sample of litigating patients who incurred an mTBI and were referred for a neuropsychological examination due to subjective complaints of cognitive function. Of the total sample, 54 patients were categorized into the non-disabled group and 25 patients were categorized into the disabled group using the 4th edition of the American Medical Association (AMA) Guides to the Evaluation of Permanent Impairment (AMA; 1993). A multivariate analysis of variance revealed that performance on the NAB-S significantly differed between the two groups, and that memory and attention domains provided a more discriminative index of disability than general neuropsychological functions. In addition, discriminant function analyses revealed that the NAB-S correctly classified 73% of patients according to their group membership. The current findings provide evidence for the ecological validity of the NAB-S as a reliable index of real-world disability status as defined by the AMA Guides.

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Acknowledgements

The authors would like to thank Sarah Francis and Thomas Palantzas for their assistance with psychometric testing. The authors report no financial support and no potential conflict of interest.

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Sekely, A., Zakzanis, K.K. Predictive Validity of the Neuropsychological Assessment Battery-Screening Module for Assessing Real-World Disability in Patients with Mild Traumatic Brain Injury. Psychol. Inj. and Law 11, 233–243 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12207-018-9329-7

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