FRIDAY, June 3 (HealthDay News) -- The Remission Evaluation and Mood Inventory Tool (REMIT) 5 is an effective self-report method which may improve the assessment of depression remission by measuring nondepressive symptoms, according to a study published in the May issue of General Hospital Psychiatry.
Donald E. Nease Jr., M.D., from the University of Michigan Medical School in Ann Arbor, and colleagues attempted to develop a conceptually-based and methodologically sound self-report measure that can be used in addition to other common depression measures for assessing remission. Analysis was used to identify candidate items from 1,003 patients with primary care clinician-identified depression. Five symptoms (future seeming dark, contentedness, emotional control, ability to bounce back, and happiness) were selected that contribute significantly to self-assessed recovery beyond the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ)-8.
The investigators found that the five selected symptoms accounted for an 11 percent increase in patient-rated remission (R²) beyond the 60 percent yielded by the PHQ-8. The REMIT 5 mean score was 9.6 (standard deviation = 4.5) for the five items summed. Incremental R² ranged from 9 percent in men to 15 percent in African-Americans in a subsample analysis.
"Depression remission is a multidimensional concept that includes important nondepressive symptom dimensions. These important dimensions can be measured using a self-report instrument feasible for routine primary care," the authors write.
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