Objectives: To find the prevalence of depressive and anxiety disorders among general hospital outpatients and to evaluate the diagnoses and treatment provided by physicians in China.
Methods: A multi-center, hospital-based cross-sectional study was conducted. A total of 8478 subjects were screened by using HADS and PHQ-15 together with medical history review list and were followed by regular clinical visit process. Physician's diagnoses and management were recorded. Mini International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI) was used to evaluate by psychiatrists afterwards for 4172 subjects scored >or= 8 on HADS.
Results: The adjusted prevalence rates of MINI-diagnosed depressive disorder, anxiety disorder, depression and anxiety, depression or anxiety disorders were 12.0%, 8.6%, 4.1% and 16.5%, respectively. The prevalence of depressive and/or anxiety disorder in outpatients visiting department of neurology and digestive diseases were higher than that in patients visiting departments of cardiovascular diseases and gynecology with statistical significance (P < 0.0001).
Conclusions: High prevalence and low identification and treatment rate of depressive and/or anxiety disorders were found in the general hospitals. In order to improve the status quo, training program for physicians and specialists other than psychiatric professionals in general hospitals should be enhanced together with psychiatric consultation.