Assessment of depression in Parkinson's disease: The contribution of somatic symptoms to the clinimetric performance of the Hamilton and Montgomery–Åsberg rating scales
Received 8 May 2009; received in revised form 18 August 2009; accepted 15 October 2009. published online 07 December 2009.
Abstract
Objective
To assess the influence of somatic symptoms of the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HAMD) and Montgomery–Åsberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS) on the clinimetric performance of these scales in patients with Parkinson's disease (PD).
Methods
A total of 224 patients underwent a protocolized mental status examination, consisting of the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-IV depressive disorder (SCID-D), as well as the HAMD and MADRS. Sensitivity, specificity, positive, and negative predictive values for a range of cut-off scores were calculated for both rating scales and for modified versions of these scales in which all somatic items were eliminated. In addition, receiver operating characteristic (ROC) curves were obtained for both the modified and unmodified scales.
Results
Elimination of the somatic items of depression from the HAMD and MADRS resulted in a reduced specificity of both the HAMD and the MADRS, and an increased sensitivity of the MADRS.
Conclusion
The authors recommend the full version of the HAMD and MADRS if used for diagnostic purposes; for screening purposes, the abbreviated version without somatic items can be used. Additional advantages of using full rating scales, with somatic items included, are that these provide more information on the severity of depression and allow for easier comparison across studies.
Department of Psychiatry, Maastricht University Medical Centre, AZ Maastricht, The Netherlands
Corresponding author. Department of Psychiatry, Maastricht University Medical Centre, P.O. Box 5800, 6202 AZ Maastricht, The Netherlands. Tel.: +31 43 3877443; fax: +31 43 3875444.
ABSTRACT