Anxiety and Related Disorders

Major Depressive Disorder-comprehensive nursing essay example

DSM: Major Depressive Disorder

Instrument: The Beck Depression Inventory-II

Article: Psychometric properties of the Beck Depression Inventory-II

Appropriateness for Dx: The BDI-II is widely used as a psychometric tool for screening depression and measuring its severity and the associated behavioral manifestations in adolescents and adults, i.e., 13 to 80 years (Wang & Gorenstein, 2013). The BDI-II was developed to counter the changes in criteria for Major Depressive Disorder highlighted in the fourth edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders published by the American Psychiatric Association. The BDI-II is appropriate has shown high reliability and capability to distinguish depression levels among individuals. The BDI-II can also be to track depression symptoms among individuals (Strunk and Lane, 2017).  Besides, it is cost-effective and has broad applicability across clinical settings and for research in depressive disorders. (Major Depressive Disorder-comprehensive nursing essay example)

Response to Therapy/Treatment: The BDI-II measures presence and severity of depressive symptoms (Tohen, Bowden, Nierenberg, & Geddes, 2015). The scale evaluates the key symptoms, which are then used to determine depression severity.(Major Depressive Disorder-comprehensive nursing essay example)

Psychometrics: The BDI-II is a self-administered psychometric questionnaire with 21 items completed in a multiple response format. In terms of feasibility, the BDI-II instrument is easy to use, complete, relatively short, and takes about ten minutes to complete. Moreover, the instrument has a high test-retest stability and internal consistency. Lastly, the BDI-II instrument has a high construct and content validity, sensitivity to change, and internal propagation.(Major Depressive Disorder-comprehensive nursing essay example)

Limitations: The BDI-II instrument’s limitations include its inability to safeguard outcomes from individual biases such as lying, faking feelings, or variability of responses (Wang & Gorenstein, 2013). This leads to instability of results over short intervals. Moreover, the BDI-II shows high sensitivity to differences in instructions, leading to a false representation of depressive thinking. Lastly, the BDI-II has high item difficulty and discrimination, and a lack of representative cures, making its objective interpretation doubtful. (Major Depressive Disorder-comprehensive nursing essay example)