The Cornell Scale for Depression in Dementia is a 19-item clinician-administered instrument. It uses information from interviews with both the patient and a nursing staff member, a method suitable for demented patients. The scale was introduced by George S. Alexopoulos.
Use Cases
- Assessing depression severity in dementia patients based on clinician-administered interviews
- Evaluating interrater reliability of clinical depression assessments based on reported metrics
- Correlating depression subtypes with Research Diagnostic Criteria based on reported correlation scores
Strengths
- High interrater reliability (kw = 0.67)
- High internal consistency (coefficient alpha: 0.84)
- Total scores correlate (0.83) with depressive subtypes classified by Research Diagnostic Criteria
Limitations
- Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment
- Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download
- License is closed, restricting open use
Provenance
- Source
- George S. Alexopoulos
- Collection Method
- Clinician-administered interviews with patient and nursing staff