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A community study of minor psychiatric morbidity in Taiwan

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

Tai Ann Cheng*
Affiliation:
Department of Psychiatry, National Taiwan University Hospital, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC
*
1 Address for correspondence: Dr Tai Ann Cheng, Department of Psychiatry, National Taiwan University Hospital, No. 1. Chang-Te Street, Taipei, Taiwan, ROC.

Synopsis

A community study of minor psychiatric morbidity (MPM) was carried out on three population samples aged 15 and above randomly selected from rural (Yenpu), suburban (Chishan), and urban (Kaohsiung) communities (N = 350 for each) in Taiwan. A two-stage case finding strategy was applied with a newly developed and validated screening questionnaire (CHQ), and a modified Chinese version of the Clinical Interview Schedule (CIS-CV). The total response rate was 99·4% and there was no time lag between the CHQ screening and the second stage clinical interview conducted by a psychiatrist. The weighted validity of the CHQ was found to be acceptable (sensitivity 69·6%, specificity 94·8%, misclassification rate 11·4%). The overall weighted prevalence rate was 18·0% for men and 33·3% for women. Both the CIS and the CHQ data are used as the morbidity indices to investigate the sociodemographic risk factors of MPM. A higher risk of MPM, which occupied 92% of the total morbidity, was found to be associated with women aged 35 and above, the unemployed men, and the lower socioeconomic status after linear modelling.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1988

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