Global assessment of functioning (GAF) ratings: determinants and role as predictors of one-year treatment outcomes.
OBJECTIVE
To assess the adequacy of global ratings of patients' psychosocial functioning, which are an integral part of the current system for obtaining multidimensional psychiatric diagnoses and are embodied by the Global Assessment of Functioning (GAF) Scale as AXIS V of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (American Psychiatric Association, 1994).


METHODS
We identified a sample of 1,688 patients with substance use disorders, many of whom also had psychiatric disorders; examined the determinants of GAF ratings; and focused on how well these ratings predicted patients' one-year symptom and psychosocial functioning outcomes.


RESULTS
Patients' clinical diagnoses and psychiatric symptoms were stronger predictors of GAF ratings than was their social and occupational functioning. Moreover, GAF ratings were only minimally associated with patients' one-year psychological, social, and occupational functioning outcomes.


CONCLUSIONS
These findings raise serious questions about the conceptual and clinical value of the current standard method of assessing psychiatric and substance abuse patients' global functioning.
Moos
R H
RH
Center for Health Care Evaluation, Veterans Affairs Health Care System, Palo Alto, CA 94304, USA.
McCoy
L
L
Moos
B S
BS
D000328:Adult; D017831:Diagnosis, Dual (Psychiatry) / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D004651:Employment; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011379:Prognosis; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000592:standards*; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D012917:Social Adjustment; D016896:Treatment Outcome