Using the Short Form-36 mental summary score as an indicator of depressive symptoms in patients with coronary heart disease

Abstract

The SF-36 MCS may be a useful research tool to aid in the classification of cardiac patients according to the presence or absence of depressive symptoms.

Polysomnographic measures of disturbed sleep are associated with reduced quality of life in multiple sclerosis

“…Adjustment for depression and stress was not performed because of the strong correlation of these two constructs with lower MCS scores (Pearson correlation coefficient −0.8 for both). This finding is consistent with previous work which recommends the MCS as a global measure of mental health, including depression [25]. MCS and PCS scores were compared between patients with and without severe OSAH with the unpaired t-test.…”

“…presence or absence of depressive symptoms in other patient populations [25]. Our finding of a strong correlation of depressive symptoms and stress with poorer MCS scores confirmed this association in MS.…”

Psychosocial outcomes and coping after complete avulsion traumatic brachial plexus injury

“…One-third of participants in this study reported symptoms of depression and five scored at or below 45 on the SF-36 MCS, which has been suggested as a cutoff point for identifying possible depression, but none had received psychotherapy [29]. This is a much higher rate than in the general population (9.0%) [32].…”

“…We included the SWAP because hand aesthetics after traumatic injury are known to be a source of social anxiety [16]. The SF-36 is a widely used instrument that assess overall mental and physical health and can be used as a screening tool for depression [29,30].…”

Health Related Quality of Life in Coronary Patients

“…In the same way, Höfer et al (Höfer et al, 2006) also observed a significant positive change over time for the physical component summary dimension (PCS) of the SF-36, but not for the mental component summary dimension (MCS). However, other authors (Elliott et al, 2003;Mancuso et al, 2000;Wells et al, 1989) have shown that the SF-36 MCS is a good indicator of depression in general and diseased populations and Tavella et al (Tavella et al, 2010) have even established a threshold score on the SF-36 MCS that would categorise a population with cardiac disease into depressed and non-depressed patients.…”