Can computers detect dementia?

Humans have at best moderate inter-rater reliability when diagnosing dementia. For the Oxford Project To Investigate Memory and Ageing, we developed computerised algorithms to aid differential diagnostics using all known criteria and compared these against post-mortem confirmation in over 200 cases and controls (Hogervorst 2003). The system which took 5 min per patient increased inter-rater reliability and validity of the diagnoses. However, such systems are applied once people present with complaints and objective cognitive impairments affecting their activities of daily life. We included visual sensitivity tests alongside our gold standard memory diagnostic test in EPIC Norfolk while working at Cambridge University in 2005. Two decades later follow-up data showed (with an average of 10-12 years before the dementia diagnoses was given) that visual sensitivity is impaired very early in the disease (Hogervorst 2024).  Automated non-invasive computerised assessments can detect early dementia.