Hostname: page-component-586b7cd67f-t7fkt Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-30T20:09:25.812Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

A study of the validity of the scaled version of the General Health Questionnaire in paralysed spinally injured out-patients

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2009

T. C. Griffiths ,
D. H. Myers  and
A. W. Talbot
T. C. Griffiths
Affiliation:
West Midlands Spinal Injuries Unit; Department of Psychiatry, Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, Shrewsbury
D. H. Myers*
Affiliation:
West Midlands Spinal Injuries Unit; Department of Psychiatry, Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, Shrewsbury
A. W. Talbot
Affiliation:
West Midlands Spinal Injuries Unit; Department of Psychiatry, Royal Shrewsbury Hospital, Shrewsbury
*
1Address for correspondence: Dr D. H. Myers, The Royal Shrewsbury Hospital (Shelton), Shrewsbury SY3 8DN.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Synopsis

This study validates the GHQ-28 on a sample of paralysed, spinally injured outpatients under the care of the West Midlands Spinal Injuries Unit. The validity of the GHQ-28 was 0·83 (95% confidence interval: 0·70 to 0·93) using the Clinical Interview Schedule (CIS) as the validating criterion. The effectiveness of the GHQ-28 as a screening instrument using CIS 11/12 as case criterion, and thus a prevalence rate of 0·18, was judged by relative operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. The area under the ROC curve was 0·91±0·03. “Optimum’ discrimination occurred near GHQ 3/4 (0011 scoring scheme) giving a sensitivity of 0·81, a specificity of 0·82 and a misclassification rate of 18%.

Type
Original Articles
Information
Psychological Medicine , Volume 23 , Issue 2 , May 1993 , pp. 497 - 504
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1993

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

Andrews, D. F., Gnanadesekan, R. & Warner, J. L. (1973). Methods for assessing multivariate normality. In Multivariate Analysis Vol. 3. (ed. Krishnaiah, P. R.), pp. 95–116. Academic Press: New York.Google Scholar
Box, G. E. P. & Cox, D. R. (1964). An analysis of transformations. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society (Series B) 26, 211–252.Google Scholar
Bridges, K. W. & Goldberg, D. P. (1986). The validation of the GHQ-28 and the use of the MMSE in neurological in-patients. British Journal of Psychiatry 148, 548–553.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Cox, D. R. & Small, N. J. H. (1978). Testing multivariate normality. Biometrika 65, 263–272.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dorfman, D. D. & Alf, E. (1969). Maximum-likelihood estimation of parameters of signal-detection, theory and determination of confidence intervals: rating method data. Journal of Mathematical Psychology 6, 487–496.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dunn, G. (1989). Design and Analysis of Reliability Studies. Oxford University Press: New York.Google Scholar
Efron, B. & Tibshirani, R. (1986). Bootstrap methods for standard errors, confidence intervals, and other measures of statistical accuracy. Statistical Science 1, 54–77.Google Scholar
Erdreich, L. S. & Lee, E. T. (1981). Use of relative operating characteristic analysis in epidemiology. American Journal of Epidemiology 114, 649–662.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Fullerton, D. T., Harvey, R. F. & Klein, M. H. (1981). Psychiatric disorders in patients with spinal cord injuries. Archives of General Psychiatry 38, 1369–1371.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goldberg, D. P. (1972). The Detection of Psychiatric Illness by Questionnaire. Oxford University Press: Oxford.Google Scholar
Goldberg, D. P. & Hillier, V. F. (1979). A scaled version of the General Health Questionnaire. Psychological Medicine 9, 139–145.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Goldberg, D. & Williams, P. (1988). A User's Guide to the General Health Questionnaire. Nfer-Nelson: Windsor.Google Scholar
Goldberg, D. P., Cooper, B., Eastwood, M. R., Kedward, H. B. & Shepherd, M. (1970). A standardized psychiatric interview for use in community surveys. British Journal of Preventive and Social Medicine 24, 18–23.Google ScholarPubMed
Hanley, J. A. & McNeil, B. J. (1982). The meaning and use of the area under a Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) Curve. Diagnostic Radiology 143, 29–36.Google Scholar
Ingham, J. G. & Miller, P. McC. (1976). The concept of prevalence applied to psychiatric disorders and symptoms. Psychological Medicine 6, 217–225.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Jöreskog, K. G. & Sörbom, D. (1989). LISREL User's Reference Guide. Scientific Software Inc.: Mooresville, USA.Google Scholar
Judd, F. K., Burrows, G. D. & Brown, D. J. (1986). Depression following acute spinal cord injury. Paraplegia 24, 358–364.Google ScholarPubMed
Judd, F. K., Stone, J., Webber, J. E., Brown, D. J. & Burrows, G. D. (1989). Depression following spinal cord injury. A prospective inpatient study. British Journal of Psychiatry 154, 668–671.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Lawson, N. (1978). Significant events in the rehabilitation process: the spinal cord patient's point of view. Archives of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation 59, 573–579.Google ScholarPubMed
Mari, J. de J. & Williams, P. (1985). A comparison of the validity of two psychiatric screening questionnaires (GHQ-12 and SRQ-20) in Brazil, using relative operating characteristic (ROC) analysis. Psychological Medicine 15, 651–659.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Metz, C. E. (1978). Basic principles of ROC analysis. Seminars in Nuclear Medicine VIII, 283–298.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Pallis, C. (1983). ABC of Brain Stem Death. British Medical Journal: London.Google ScholarPubMed
Pan, P. C. & Goldberg, D. P. (1990). A comparison of validity of GHQ-12 and CHQ-12 in Chinese primary care patients in Manchester. Psychological Medicine 20, 931–940.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Robinson, M., Cookson, I. & White, K. (1982). The ‘consentiam’ effect: are your joint ratings really independent? British Journal of Medical Psychology 55, 285–286.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Ryan, B. F., Joiner, B. L. & Ryan, T. A. (1989). Minitab Version 7.2.Google Scholar
Shepherd, M. & Clare, A. W. (1981). Addendum to Psychiatric Illness in General Practice 2nd edn (ed. Shepherd, M., Cooper, B. and Brown, A. C.), pp. 208–227. Oxford University Press: Oxford.Google Scholar
Srivastava, M. S. & Carter, E. M. (1983). An Introduction to Applied Multivariate Statistics. North-Holland: Oxford.Google Scholar
Stengel, E. (1967). Recent developments in classification. In Recent Developments in Schizophrenia: A Symposium (ed. Coppen, A. and Walk, A.), pp. 1–7. Headley Brothers Ltd.: Ashford, Kent.Google Scholar
Swets, J. A. (1979). ROC analysis applied to the evaluation of medical imaging techniques. Investigative Radiology 14, 109–121.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Swets, J. A., Pickett, R. M., Whitehead, S. F., Getty, D. J., Schnur, J. A., Swets, J. B. & Freeman, B. A. (1979). Assessment of Diagnostic Technologies. Science 205, 753–759.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Tarnopolsky, A., Hand, D. J., McLean, E. K., Roberts, H. & Wiggins, R. D. (1979). Validity and uses of a screening questionnaire (GHQ) in the community. British Journal of Psychiatry 134, 508–515.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Trieschman, R. B. (1980). Spinal Cord Injuries – Psychological, Social and Vocational Adjustment. (Letter to the Editor: Addendum.) Pergamon Press: New York.Google Scholar