title: Symptoms of depression in older home-care patients: patient and informant reports.
abstract: The purpose of this study was to examine the level of agreement and patterns of disagreement between home-care patient and informant reports of depressive symptoms. The authors interviewed a sample of 355 older home-care patients and their informants using the Structured Diagnostic Interview for DSM-IV (R. L. Spitzer, M. Gibbon, & J. B. Williams, 1995). Informants reported more psychological symptoms than patients, and this type of discrepancy was higher for patients with cognitive impairment and patients who had younger informants. Younger informants also reported more cognitive symptoms, whereas patients were more likely to report suicidal thoughts or ideation if they were not cognitively impaired. The patterns of these discrepancies may reflect age- and cohort-related response bias in the reports of depressive symptoms obtained from older adults.
authors.affiliation: Program on Aging, Yale University, New Haven, CT 06510, USA. gail.mcavay@yale.edu
authors.forename: Gail J
authors.initials: GJ
authors.lastname: McAvay
authors.forename: Patrick J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Raue
authors.forename: Ellen L
authors.initials: EL
authors.lastname: Brown
authors.forename: Martha L
authors.initials: ML
authors.lastname: Bruce
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D000369:Aged, 80 and over; D003072:Cognition Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003863:Depression / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D005260:Female; D006699:Home Care Services; D006801:Humans; D007395:Interneurons; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D009483:Neuropsychological Tests / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D010552:Personality Assessment / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D010555:Personality Inventory / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011594:Psychometrics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012650:Self Disclosure; D013001:Somatoform Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000523:psychology; D013223:Statistics as Topic; D013405:Suicide / Q000523:psychology