Accurately screening cancer patients for major depression is possible with just a two-question survey, according to a study presented at the American Society for Radiation Oncology's 55th Annual Meeting.
Researchers administered a short survey to 455 cancer patients receiving radiation therapy across the country.
The survey asks if, over the last two weeks, the patient has experienced:
- Little interest or pleasure in activities
- Feeling down, depressed or hopeless
Patient answers are scored on a scale from zero to three, where zero indicates not at all, one indicates several days, two indicates more than half of the days and three indicates nearly every day. A composite score of three or more on the questions indicates risk for major depression.
Sixteen percent of patients researchers screened tested positive for depression risk. When physicians interviewed this group with the standard Structured Clinical Interview for DSM IV Disorders and compared the results to the two-question survey, the shorter survey was 83 percent accurate in indicating major depression risk, according to a news release.
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