Identifying depression in primary care: a comparison of different methods in a prospective cohort study
BMJ 2003; 326 doi: https://doi.org/10.1136/bmj.326.7382.200 (Published 25 January 2003) Cite this as: BMJ 2003;326:200
- Verena Henkel (verena.henkel@psy.med.uni-muenchen.de), psychiatrista,
- Roland Mergl, psychologista,
- Ralf Kohnen, professorb,
- Wolfgang Maier, professorc,
- Hans-Jürgen Möller, professora,
- Ulrich Hegerl, professora
- a Department of Psychiatry, Ludwig-Maximilians-University Munich, Nußbaumstr 7, D-80336 Munich, Germany
- b Institute for Medical Research Management and Biometrics (IMEREM), Scheurlstr 21, D-90478 Nuremberg, Germany
- c Department of Psychiatry, University of Bonn, Sigmund-Freud-Str 25, D-53105 Bonn, Germany
- Correspondence to: V Henkel
- Accepted 15 August 2002
Depressive disorders are a major health problem in primary care, and at least half of these disorders remain undetected.1 There are two recommended approaches to diagnosing depression in primary care: one is to perform routine screening, and the other is to evaluate patients only when the clinical presentation triggers the suspicion of depression. Our aim was to compare these two approaches, and to compare three different screening tools in order to evaluate which would be most appropriate for use in primary care. From among the many available screening tools, we selected three brief, self rating instruments: one disorder-specific (the depression module of the brief patient health questionnaire (B-PHQ, 9 items)),2 one broad based (the general health questionnaire (GHQ-12, 12 items)),3 and one that is less restricted to both issues (WHO-5 wellbeing index (WHO-5, 5 items)).4
Methods and results
Eighteen primary care facilities …