Recognising, Assessing and Responding to Cognitive Impairment in the Context of AOD Rehabilitation.

In November and early December 2016 Dr Jamie Berry, Senior Clinical Neuropsychologist and Director at Advanced Neuropsychological Treatment Services (ANTS) in Sydney, delivered three one-day workshops on using the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA) to assess and use to develop appropriate strategies to respond to cognitive impairment in people accessing addiction treatment.

The workshops followed Dr Berry’s engaging and informative presentation to the Christchurch Addiction Leadership Day the day before. This presentation is available on the Matua Raki website.

The MoCA is a validated tool to screen for the presence of cognitive impairment that does not require the time, the training or specific neuropsychological skills to use and interpret. While the MoCA results are indicative of cognitive impairment and probable damage in a range of brain locations, and thus functioning, results are not specific or detailed enough to generate diagnostic information and as such it does not replace a full neuropsychological assessment. However, with limited access to neuropsychologists in most areas of New Zealand the use of the MoCA fills an important function when completing a comprehensive assessment and developing appropriate treatment and intervention planning with people accessing addiction services. 

As Dr Berry points out, up to 80% of people accessing treatment is for addiction, will be experiencing a level of compromised cognitive functioning. It is important that people working in the addiction sector, have a good understanding of the impact of limited cognitive functioning, are able to assess for this and adapt treatment plans accordingly.

The initial session provided by Dr Berry were very well received and Dr Berry was invited to return to New Zealand for a series of 11 workshops provided throughout the country. The aim was to give a larger number of addiction practitioners the opportunity to familiarise themselves with and learn to administer the MoCA and, equally importantly, to use the specific information identified from people’s responses to the MoCA to put into place ‘cognitive remediation’ strategies to help people with specific frontal lobe deficits.

Overall the interest in these workshops has been outstanding and they have been very well-supported, with most sessions over-subscribed. Dr Berry is an engaging presenter who provides practitioners with very relevant and practical knowledge and skills to understand and work with cognitive impairment. Feedback from attendees has been extremely positive.

Dr Berry rounded off this tour of New Zealand at the end of June with four workshops in Dunedin, Christchurch, Hamilton and Wellington, which were all fully booked.