BECK DEPRESSION INVENTORY IN THE DETECTION OF DEPRESSION AMONG NEUROLOGICAL INPATIENTS

The validity of the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) was assessed in a group of 150 neurological inpatients using Receiver Operating Characte ristic analysis and DSM-III-R as external criterion. As regards depres sive disorders as a whole, it was found that the best trade-off betwee n sensitivity and specificity was the cutoff score of 20. The discrimi nating ability of the BDI for major depressive disorder was quite sati sfactory at the cutoff score of 29 contrary to the dysthymic disorder in which the discriminating power of the BDI was not acceptable. In co nclusion, the use of the BDI in neurological settings is useful with c utoff scores depending on the research purposes.