The Frontal Assessment Battery: Relationship with functional status indicators and caregiver burden in veterans

Whitney Stubbs

Data is provided by the student.

Abstract

Objective: Neurocognitive screening measures reflective of functional status are needed for detection of executive dysfunction. The Frontal Assessment Battery (FAB), a measure designed to assess executive functioning at bedside, lacks sufficient research establishing its ecological validity. The purpose of the study was to evaluate the ecological validity of the FAB by examining its relationship with the Functional Status Interview (FSI), a measure of basic activities (ADL) and instrumental activities (IADL), and a measure of caregiver burden (ZBI-R). Method: Participants in the primary sample were 168 veterans with a mean age of 81.3 years (SD = 7.6). Prior to main analyses, principal axis factoring examined the factor structure of FSI and confirmed the existence of two subscales, ADL and IADL. Correlations were calculated to examine relationships between FAB and other measures. Results: Two FSI factors (ADL and IADL) were identified with all items having strong loadings with the expected scale (absolute values of > .40) and factors accounting for 56.4% of the variance. ADL and IADL were strongly correlated. Main findings indicated a significant relationship between FAB and ADL, which slightly increased when controlling for demographic variables. A strong significant relationship was found between FAB and IADL. FAB and caregiver burden subscales were unrelated; however, when controlling for demographic variables, a weak relationship emerged with the ZBI-R dependency burden subscale. Conclusions: This study provides initial support for the ecological validity of the FAB in a sample of United States veterans. Cultural and clinical implications are discussed.