Introduction The Comprehensive Geriatric Assessment (CGA) is an evaluation conducted on older people to detect limitations of health in multiple domains. However, CGA is a time-consuming assessment and so the use of abbreviated screening instruments, as the Vulnerable Elders Survey (VES-13) has been proposed. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the performance of the VES-13 in elders who live in Brazilian long-stay institutions.

Methods This is a study with elderly residents of long-stay institutions in four Brazilian cities. The assessment of functional, emotional and cognitive domains was performed with CGA and with VES-13. Individuals were scored separately with both instruments and classified accordingly. The proportion of positives identified in each domain with the CGA was compared to that of the VES-13. The characteristics of the targeted group were compared with those not selected using the χ² test.

Results These are preliminary results for 340 elders. Mean age was 75.5 years and 304 (89.4%) were considered as vulnerable (score ≥3). VES-13 identified correctly 90.5% of the elders with cognitive impairment, 99.3% of those with dependence in ADL, 99.5% of those in IADL and 86.9% of those who had depression. Compared to those not selected targeted individuals were older (80 years or more), male, had cognitive impairment and were dependent in ADL and in IADL (p<0.001).

Conclusions VES-13 performed well as a screening instrument in this particular setting, identifying the majority of those elders with functionality problems, cognitive impairment and depression and who would need further evaluation with CGA.