title: Somatic items in the assessment of depressive symptoms in pediatric patients with diabetes.
abstract: Depression inventories contain somatic items which may be related to disease rather than to depression in individuals with chronic illness. Adolescents with type 1 diabetes (n = 151) and medically well controls (n = 68) completed the Center for Epidemiological Studies-Depression Scale (CES-D) which includes somatic and cognitive/affective symptoms. Diabetes patients reported higher levels of all depressive symptoms than controls; the discrepancy was equivalent for somatic and cognitive/affective symptoms. For diabetes patients, somatic and cognitive/affective symptoms did not correlate with indices of disease control except for number of diabetes-related hospitalizations, where the correlations were equivalent. In participants with diabetes and in controls, somatic and cognitive/affective symptoms were strongly correlated with each other. These findings were not moderated by level of depressive symptoms. Our study suggests that the somatic items on the CES-D do not confound the measurement of depressive symptoms in young people with type 1 diabetes.
authors.affiliation: Department of Psychiatry, University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center at Dallas, 5323 Harry Hines Boulevard, Dallas, TX 75390-8589, USA. sunita.stewart@utsouthwestern.edu
authors.forename: Sunita M
authors.initials: SM
authors.lastname: Stewart
authors.forename: Alex
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Simmons
authors.forename: Perrin C
authors.initials: PC
authors.lastname: White
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D003863:Depression / Q000150:complications / Q000175:diagnosis*; D003922:Diabetes Mellitus, Type 1 / Q000150:complications / Q000523:psychology*; D005260:Female; D006304:Health Status; D006760:Hospitalization; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012720:Severity of Illness Index