Frontal assessment battery in Parkinson's disease: A study on 170 patients

Background: Frontal assessment battery (FAB) was devised as a specific study design to assess frontal lobe dysfunction. Since Parkinson's disease (PD) is often associated with cognitive and other higher mental function complications, FAB test has been carried out by a number of workers to assess the integrity of the frontal lobe. On the other hand, the other frequently conducted test, performed in order to evaluate the mental status, is the Mini Mental State examination of Folstein (MMSE), but its reliability has been questioned in PD, since it does not assess the functions of the frontal lobe alone. Material and Methods: The present study was undertaken in order to assess the suitability of application of the FAB test in Indian patients and to perform its comparative analysis with the MMSE scale. Results and Conclusions: It was observed that the FAB test correlated with the age and the level of education of the patient. The results also correlated with that of the MMSE study, in spite of the fact that the latter is not considered to be a test which can assess exclusively the status of the frontal lobe. To the best of our knowledge, this is first study undertaken in India in this regard.