A pilot study of an electronic, adolescent version of the quick inventory of depressive symptomatology.
BACKGROUND
Adolescent depression assessments are time-intensive, often requiring separate interviews with an adolescent and a parent/ informant. In adults, a self-rated, interactive voice response (IVR) version of the Quick Inventory of Depressive Symptomatology (QIDS-IVR) has been shown to be reliable, valid, and sensitive to change. An adolescent version of the QIDS (QIDS-A-IVR) was created using speaker-independent voice recognition technology. An informant version, QIDS-P-IVR, collects ratings from parents or other knowledgeable adults.


METHODS
The study included 27 adolescents ranging from 12 to 17 years of age, 48% of whom were female. During a single office visit, adolescents completed the QIDS-A-IVR and parents completed the QIDS-P-IVR. A clinician completed the clinician-rated adult version of the QIDS separately for adolescents (QIDS-C-A) and parents (QIDS-C-P) and the Children's Depression Rating Scale-Revised (CDRS-R). The study was conducted from October 2005 to April 2006.


RESULTS
Cronbach alpha of the QIDS-A-IVR was .85. The QIDS-A-IVR correlated significantly with the QIDS-C-A (r = 0.95) and the CDRS-R (r = 0.76), both p < .01. Conversely, the correlations of the QIDS-A-IVR with the QIDS-P-IVR and the QIDS-C-P were small and nonsignificant. The QIDS-A-IVR required adolescents a mean of 6 minutes and 31 seconds to complete (SD = 41 seconds). The voice recognition technology correctly identified the adolescents' spoken words in 92% of the 483 spoken responses. The system recognized a response from all adolescents on all items.


CONCLUSIONS
This study supports the reliability and validity of the QIDS-A-IVR as an adolescent depression measure. The QIDS-A-IVR may provide clinicians and researchers with a sound, technology-based method of assessing adolescent depression. Future research is needed on the informational value of parent ratings of adolescent depression.
Moore
Heidi K
HK
Healthcare Technology Systems, Inc., Madison, WI 53717, USA.
Hughes
Carroll W
CW
Mundt
James C
JC
Rush
A John
AJ
Macleod
Laurie
L
Emslie
Graham J
GJ
Jain
Shailesh
S
Geralts
Dayna S
DS
Bernstein
Ira H
IH
Horrigan
Joseph P
JP
Trivedi
Madhukar H
MH
Greist
John H
JH
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D003863:Depression / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D004581:Electronics / Q000295:instrumentation*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D010865:Pilot Projects; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D012720:Severity of Illness Index; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires