title: Interrater reliability, prevalence, and relation to ICD-10 diagnoses of the Diagnostic Criteria for Psychosomatic Research in consultation-liaison psychiatry patients.
abstract: The Diagnostic Criteria for Psychosomatic Research (DCPR) have been proposed by an international group of psychosomatic investigators as an operationalized tool for the assessment of psychological distress in medical patients. The aims of the present study were to evaluate interrater reliability, the distribution of DCPR syndromes, and their relationship with ICD-10 diagnostic categories. One hundred consecutive patients who were referred for psychiatric consultation in a university general hospital consented to assessment for DCPR syndromes as elicited in a joint interview conducted by two researchers. The results showed excellent interrater agreement, with kappa values for the 11 DCPR syndromes ranging from 0.69 to 0.97. More patients met criteria for one or more of the DCPR (87%) than for an ICD-10 diagnosis (75%). Four DCPR syndromes were particularly prevalent: demoralization, alexithymia, illness denial, and type A behavior. DCPR criteria appear to be a useful, reliable, and promising approach in the assessment and description of psychological distress in medical patients. They may serve as a focus of intervention studies in this population.
authors.affiliation: Consultation/Liaison Psychiatry Service, Department of Neuroscience TCR, Section of Psychiatry, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy. galeazzi@unimo.it
authors.forename: Gian Maria
authors.initials: GM
authors.lastname: Galeazzi
authors.forename: Silvia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Ferrari
authors.forename: Andrew
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mackinnon
authors.forename: Marco
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Rigatelli
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D038801:International Classification of Diseases / Q000592:standards*; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D015588:Observer Variation; D015995:Prevalence; D011602:Psychophysiologic Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology*; D012017:Referral and Consultation; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012106:Research