short depression screening test for patients with epilepsy:ces-d with 10 items

objective: depression is the most common co-morbid psychiatric disorder in patients with epilepsy. yet it remains under recognized and under-treated. for depression screening in this patient need to a convenient questionnaire for patients with epilepsy. this questionnaire has shown high sensitivity for depression screening in many studies. the center for epidemiological studies depression scale (ces-d) has been widely used in studies of late-life depression. the ces-d is easy to use in most settings.
method: two groups of patients from two hospital centers were selected to participate in this study: the control group and the experimental group which included patients with approved diagnosis of epilepsy, regardless of any type of seizures. then all the subjects went through a semi structural clinical interview for (scid-i) dsm-iv by one psychiatrist. consequently, all the patients completed the ces-d 10 items questionnaire along with the interview. in the two groups, the cesd scale cut-off point was obtained using roc analysis.
results: the optimal cut-off score of ces-d in the both group was .3. sensitivity, specificity, and positive predicted values in the epileptic group were 86.4%, 55.3%and 60% ; and sensitivity, specificity, and positive predictedvalues in the control group were 72.7% ,68.6%, 38.3% respectively.
conclusion: it appears that ces-d 10 items is an appropriate tool for screening patients with epilepsy, particularly if the multi-stage screening system is used with other methods.