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Introduction: Hypertension is a major risk factor for cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases. Thus, regular and accurate measurement of Blood Pressure (BP) is essential for its early diagnosis and follow-up. There is a surge in popularity of digital sphygmomanometer due to its convenience of use and functionality. In contrast, the traditional universally accepted sphygmomanometer is aneroid type, hence there arise a need for comparison of digital and universally accepted Aneroid Sphygmomanometer in terms of agreement and correlation. Aim: To evaluate the agreement and correlation between blood pressure measurement by digital and aneroid sphygmomanometer. Materials and Methods: The clinic based cross-sectional study was conducted in the Out Patient Department (OPD) of Urban Heath Centre, All India Institute of Hygiene and Public Health, Kolkata, West Bengal, India. Adults visiting the OPD on two chosen days of the week, between June 2019 to July 2019 were selected using systematic random sampling. A total of 400 participants were included. Agreement and correlation between BP measurements by digital and aneroid sphygmomanometer was analysed by Cohen's Kappa, Bland Altman Plot along with sensitivity, specificity and predictive values using Microsoft Excel and Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS) version 16.0. the p-value <0.05 was considered significant for the statistical test in the analysis. Results: Cohen's Kappa value (0.59) revealed these two tools had moderate agreement in diagnosing hypertension. Sensitivity and specificity of digital sphygmomanometer taking aneroid sphygmomanometer as gold standard is 86% and 83.1% respectively. The BP readings of these two-tools showed moderate correlation as Intraclass Correlation Coefficient (ICC) for Systolic BP (SBP) and Diastolic BP (DBP) were 0.804 and 0.624, respectively. Bland Altman plot showed gross disagreement of SBP findings and disagreement between DBP findings was also noted. Conclusion: Digital device was found to be less accurate in detecting hypertension. Therefore, more similar research work is solicited to verify the accuracy of the very easy to use, the Digital BP monitor. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Alzheimer Questionnaire (AQ) and Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) are tools for assessment of cognitive impairment. MoCA is a common tool for screening of cognitive impairment but it requires trained personnel. AQ questionnaire is informant-based, simple and less time consuming with or without the involvement of trained personnel. Aim: To estimate the prevalence of cognitive impairment and to find out the accuracy of AQ compared to MoCA in Cognitive Impairment screening among elderly population in an urban area of West Bengal. Materials and Methods: The Prospective cross-sectional study was conducted in urban field practice area of All India Institute of Hygiene and Public Health, Kolkata among 140 randomly selected elderly population from June to September 2019. Accuracy of AQ with MoCA tool as gold standard in screening cognitive impairment was analysed by Cohen’s Kappa, Receiver Operating Characteristics (ROC) Curve, Spearman rho Coefficient along with sensitivity, specificity, predictive values and likelihood ratio was obtained. Results: Prevalence of cognitive impairment using MoCA and AQ was 40% (95%CI=31.8-48.6) and 36.4% (95% CI=28.5- 45.0), respectively. AQ and MoCA showed good agreement (Cohen’s kappa, κ=0.834; 95% CI=0.739-0.928). The AQ and MoCA showed a strong negative correlation (spearman’s rho=-0.709; 95%CI=0.764-0.884, p-value <0.001). Considering MoCA as gold standard, AQ showed sensitivity of 85.7% (95% CI=74.2-92.6), specificity of 96.4% (95% CI=89.9-98.7) for cognitive impairment screening and the Positive predictive value of this tool was 94.1% (95% CI=84.0-97.9%). The Youden index of 0.821 showed highest sum of sensitivity and specificity of AQ tool at 4.5 score to anticipate cognitive impairment. Conclusion: AQ is equally effective as MoCA to screen cognitive impairment among elderly at the community level. AQ can be used even by grass root level health workers without involvement of trained personnel. So, community level screening of elderly for cognitive dysfunction can be made even in resource poor settings. Early identification and referral of elderly with cognitive dysfunction will help them in better living. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]