title: Validation of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale in Arab patients.
abstract: The Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) was administered to psychiatric outpatients with various diagnoses to assess its validity. The study was also designed to find out whether HADS can differentiate between diagnostic groups based on depression and anxiety symptoms. HADS was able to discriminate patients from controls at a sensitivity of 79% and specificity of 87%. HADS was much less sensitive, specific and diagnostically accurate in identifying anxiety and depressive disorders in the experimental group at a cut-off point of 13 and 10 respectively for both conditions. Possible psychological, social and psychiatric reasons for the results are discussed.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, Faculty of Medicine, Kuwait University.
authors.forename: T H
authors.initials: TH
authors.lastname: Malasi
authors.forename: I A
authors.initials: IA
authors.lastname: Mirza
authors.forename: M F
authors.initials: MF
authors.lastname: el-Islam
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000553:Ambulatory Care; D001008:Anxiety Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology*; D003431:Cross-Cultural Comparison; D003866:Depressive Disorder / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology*; D003906:Developing Countries; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D007730:Kuwait; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results