Simple screening despite depression in cancer patients
Cancer patients have power to be accurately screened for major indentation with a simple two-question scan, according to a study presented at the American Society instead of Radiation Oncology's 55th Annual Meeting.
The sum of units-question screening test proved to exist as accurate as a longer nine-topic screening test.
The study was presented at full session by William Small, Jr., MD, FASTRO, presiding officer of the Department of Radiation Oncology of Loyola University Medical Center.
"We place that a two-question survey be able to effectively screen for depression," Small afore. "We hope this will prompt greater amount of centers to screen for depression, and to hint at patients for treatment when necessary."
The brace-question survey asks whether, over the latest two weeks, a patient has versed:
Little interest or pleasure in doing things
Feeling from a thin to a dense state, depressed or hopeless
For each motion, the patient can answer not at everything (worth zero points); several days (1 projection); more than half the days (pair points); or nearly every day (3 points). A long-suffering who scores a total of three or in greater numbers points on both questions is considered to subsist at risk for being depressed.
The study included 455 cancer patients receiving ir therapy at 37 centers in the United States. Patients were surveyed before or within two weeks of receiving their foremost radiation treatment. Sixteen percent screened over-confident for depression.
For comparison purposes, patients who screened explicit were administered an in-depth telephone interview known as SCID, which is considered the gold upright for diagnosing depression. A random pattern of patients who screened negative conducive to depression also underwent the SCID parley. (SCID stands for Structured Clinical Interview with regard to DSM IV Disorders.)
The two-topic survey consists of the first brace questions of the nine-question Patient Health Questionnaire. The study form in a mould that the abbreviated two-question supervise was just as accurate as the replete nine-question survey. In statistical articles of agreement, both surveys had an "area by means of the curve" of 0.83. (A 100 percent strict test would have an area while burdened with the curve of 1.0.)
The pair-question screening test was more true than two other screening tests researchers administered. These inferior-accurate screening tests are the Hopkins Symptom Checklist (0.79 district under the curve) and the National Comprehensive Cancer Network Distress Thermometer (0.60 realm under the curve).
The study establish that 78 percent of centers routinely defend patients for depression at the irradiance therapy facility, with 51 percent screening at the at the beginning visit. Mental health services were useful at 68 percent of radiation therapy facilities. However, 67 percent of sites offered merely social workers; 17 percent offered psychologists and 22 percent offered psychiatrists.
"We contemplate the results of this large, nationwide examination will have a major impact adhering how cancer patients are screened instead of depression," Small said.
