Screening for Depression in Adult Patients with Multiple Sclerosis

Major depression and suicide are high among patients with MS. Despite the high prevalence of depression among persons with MS, only half of patients are screened and depression often remains undetected. Objective: To determine the correlation between the Beck Depression inventory-II (BDI-II) and the Beck Depression Inventory Fast Screen (BDI-FS), and to determine if the degree of disability as measured by the Expanded Disability Status Scale (EDSS) and the number of MS relapses were correlated with depression as measured by the BDI-II, and the BDI-FS. Methods: A sample of 34 persons with MS was selected from an urban neurological outpatient clinic in the Northeast United States. Descriptive, Chi-Square and Pearson correlations were used to analyze the data. Results: The sample was primarily female (71%), Caucasian (73.5%), married (56%), educated (67%), and lived with a partner or their family (68%). There was a significant positive correlation between the BDI-II and BDI-FS (r =0.82, p=0.01). The BDI-FS identified significantly more depressed persons than the BDI-II (X2=22.61, df=1, p< 0.001). There was no correlation between the extent of disability or number of MS relapses and depression as measured by either the BDI-II or BDI-FS. Conclusions: The study supports the ability of both tools to identify depressive symptoms among individuals with MS. The BDI-FS may be more efficient in identifying depression in the clinical setting among MS patients since it contains no items that assess symptoms commonly associated with MS.