In order to evaluate the Cornell Medical Index-Health Questionnaire (CMI) as a screening device for depressive disorders, we conducted a study in 240 patients (117 males and 123 females, 18-83 years of age with a mean of 57.7 years) who had suffered from tinnitus, dizziness, sore tongue and/or throat discomfort that are often associated with affective disorders.
All the patients underwent the following 3 tests simultaneously; CMI, self-rating depression scale (SDS) and self-rating questionnaire for depression (SRQ-D). Individuals who gave one or more “yes” answers to the following 6 questions in the “depression” section on the CMI were classified into “depressive” and the remainder “non-depressive”.
1. Do you feel alone and sad at a party?
2. Do you usually feel unhappy and depressed?
3. Do you often cry?
4. Are you always miserable and blue?
5. Does life look entirely hopeless?
6. Do you often wish you were dead and away from it all?
The result obtained by the CMI method mentioned above was significantly correlated with that by eigher of SDS and SRQ-D (P<0.0001 by chi-square test). Supposing that a depressive state was correctly diagnosed by SDS and SRQ-D as well, the sensitivity of the CMI method, namely the proportion of true positives that were correctly identified by the CMI method, was low (30.6% against SDS, 30.9% against SRQ-D). On the other hand, the specificity of the CMI method, namely the proportion of true negatives that were correctly identified by the CMI method, washigh enough (93.2% against SDS, 89.3% against SRQ-D).
These results suggest that the CMI can provide a simple andfairly accurate estimate of depressive disorders.