Psychiatric rating scales and questionnaires

What it is

The scales sit in the psychological limb of the bio psychosocial approach, next to the biological tests and the social assessment. For depression the two named are the Hamilton rating scale for depression and the Beck depression inventory. The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommends depression screening for all adolescents 12-18 years of age. The PHQ-2 is a brief screening tool, and a positive result merits further evaluation, which should include a full PHQ-A or a discussion with a qualified clinician. For cognition the named tests are the Confusion Assessment Method (CAM), the Mini-Cog, the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE), the Montreal Cognitive Assessment test (MoCA) and the Saint Louis University Mental Status exam (SLUMS). Beside them stands the Menopause Rating Scale, which asks about 11 symptoms in three categories, somatic, psychological and urogenital, with a total score that is the sum of each subscale score. In a cross-sectional study of 472 healthy Omani women between 40 and 60 years old, somatic and psychological symptoms occurred more frequently than urogenital symptoms in all three stages: muscle and joint pain was the most common symptom at 73.3%, followed by mental and physical exhaustion at 47.2% and anxiety at 46.6%, and the severity rose with age, with an advanced stage of menopause, and with a lower educational level.