Diagnostic accuracy of a Brazilian depression self-report measure (EBADEP): Original and short versions

The present study aimed to investigate the diagnostic accuracy of a scale for the assessment of depressive symptoms, the EBADEP-A, and its short version. Also, we propose the application of the concept of equivalence to compare the discriminative capacity between the two scales, i.e., to determine whether a new procedure (i.e., EBADEP-A short version) is not worse than the procedure in use (i.e., the EBADEP-A). Participants were 80 individuals, 40 with a diagnostic of major depressive disorder based on SCID-I, and 40 healthy controls. Age mean was about 41, and most participants were female (85%). We calculated sensitivity, specificity, positive and negative likelihood ratio, positive and negative predictive power, and negative predictive power (PP−), based on the ROC curve for the EBADEP-A full and short versions. Both versions of EBADEP-A proved useful for the diagnostic of major depression. We concluded that the short version of EBADEP-A is closely equivalent to its extended version. Based on the results we found, we conclude that using diagnostic accuracy combined to the concept of equivalence can not only assist professionals with a focus on psychometric parameters, but also have an impact on the application of the tools in clinical settings.