At. Beck et al., SCREENING FOR MAJOR DEPRESSION DISORDERS IN MEDICAL INPATIENTS WITH THE BECK-DEPRESSION-INVENTORY FOR PRIMARY-CARE, Behaviour research and therapy, 35(8), 1997, pp. 785-791
To ascertain how effective the Beck Depression Inventory for Primary C
are (BDI-PC) was for differentiating medical inpatients who were and w
ere not diagnosed with DSM-IV major depression disorders (MDD)), this
7-item self-report instrument composed of cognitive and affective symp
toms was administered to 50 medical inpatients along with the Depressi
on subscale (HDS) from the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (Zigm
ond & Snaith, 1983,. Acta Psychiatrica Scandinavica, 67, 361-370). The
Mood Module from the Primary Care Evaluation of Mental Disorders (Spi
tzer et al., 1995, Prime MD instruction manual updated for DSM-IV) was
used to diagnose MDD. The internal consistency of the BDI-PC was high
(alpha = 0.86), and it was moderately correlated with the HDS (r = 0.
62, P < 0.001). The BDI-PC was not significantly correlated with sex,
age, ethnicity, or type of medical diagnosis. A BDI-PC cut-off score o
f 4 and above yielded the maximum clinical efficiency with both 82% se
nsitivity and specificity rates. The clinical utility of the BDI-PC fo
r identifying medical inpatients who should be evaluated for MDD is di
scussed. (C) 1997 Elsevier Science Ltd.