Asian Journal of Psychiatry
Volume 2, Issue 2 , Pages 63-65, June 2009

Applicability of 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale to detect depression in elderly medical outpatients

  • Om Prakash

      Affiliations

    • Geriatric Clinic & Services, Department of Psychiatry, National Institute of Mental Health & Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bangalore, India
    • Corresponding Author InformationCorresponding author. Tel.: +91 8026995351; fax: +91 8026564830.
    • ,
  • Laxmi Narayan Gupta

      Affiliations

    • Department of Psychiatry, S.P. Medical College, Bikaner, India
    • ,
  • Veer Bhadur Singh

      Affiliations

    • Geriatric Clinic, Department of Internal Medicine, S.P. Medical College, Bikaner, India
    • ,
  • Girish Nagarajarao

      Affiliations

    • Department of Epidemiology, National Institute of Mental Health & Neurosciences (NIMHANS), Bangalore, India

Received 2 January 2009; received in revised form 12 March 2009; accepted 10 April 2009. published online 16 August 2011.

Abstract 

Elder depressives approach physicians for their medical problems, but the detection of their depression is poor. This study aimed to explore the screening for depressive symptoms using a 15-item Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) in medical clinics. The study was carried out in outpatient setting of geriatric clinic of tertiary care hospital using the Hindi version of GDS-15. Out of 100 eligible older medical clinic patients, 22% of participants scored high on the GDS (≥5) and 18% were definitely having a depressive disorder as per ICD10. The sensitivity of the GDS instrument was 100% and specificity 94%. This study confirmed that a brief screening instrument like the GDS helps physicians to identify and diagnose depression in the medical settings. The need of the hour is to train health personnel involved in geriatric care regarding identifying, diagnosing and managing depression in medical clinics.

Keywords: Geriatric depression, Assessment geriatric, Geriatric Depression Scale, Outpatient Clinics Hospital

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PII: S1876-2018(09)00028-8

doi:10.1016/j.ajp.2009.04.005

Asian Journal of Psychiatry
Volume 2, Issue 2 , Pages 63-65, June 2009

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