| Abstract: | This paper presents the Swedish translation of stepwise comparative status analysis (STEP), which is a clinical method for identifying regional brain syndromes in dementia, developed by Wallin and colleagues. Added are guidelines with regard to the order in which the items can be assessed and a checklist including those items that require information from relatives or nursing staff to be correctly assessed (such as items connected with the patient's premorbid personality). The analysis is made in three steps, including evaluation of primary, compound, and complex status variables. The primary variables represent single symptoms and signs (for example, memory disturbance, apraxia, and mental slowness). The compound variables represent symptom constellations that suggest damage to certain brain regions (for example, instrumental difficulties). Scores on the presence and intensity of the primary and compound variables form the basis of the evaluation of the complex variables. These represent regional brain syndromes (global, frontal, subcortical, parietal, frontosubcortical, and frontoparietal), among which the one that dominates is identified by means of elimination. STEP can be used in the diagnostic evaluation of suspected dementia. It might also be useful in identifying predementia states. |
