Level of agreement between self-rated and clinician-rated instruments when measuring major depressive disorder in the Thai elderly: a 1-year assessment as part of the THAISAD study.

Purpose: Whether self-reporting and clinician-rated depression scales correlate well with one another when applied to older adults has not been well studied, particularly among Asian samples. This study aimed to compare the level of agreement among measurements used in assessing major depressive disorder (MDD) among the Thai elderly and the factors associated with the differences found.

Patients And Methods: This was a prospective, follow-up study of elderly patients diagnosed with MDD and receiving treatment in Thailand.

Baseline characteristics of depressive disorders in Thai outpatients: findings from the Thai Study of Affective Disorders.

Background: The Thai Study of Affective Disorders was a tertiary hospital-based cohort study developed to identify treatment outcomes among depressed patients and the variables involved. In this study, we examined the baseline characteristics of these depressed patients.

Methods: Patients were investigated at eleven psychiatric outpatient clinics at tertiary hospitals for the presence of unipolar depressive disorders, as diagnosed by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition.