Rasch analysis of the hospital anxiety and depression scale among Chinese cataract patients

Structural and functional abnormalities in the medial prefrontal cortex were associated with pain and depressive symptoms in patients with adhesive capsulitis

Introduction

Chronic pain and depression have been shown to coexist in patients with adhesive capsulitis (AC). Recent studies identified the shared brain plasticity between pain and depression; however, how such neuroplasticity contributes to AC remains unclear. Here, we employed a combination of psychophysics, structural MRI, and functional MRI techniques to examine the brain's structural and functional changes in AC.

Methods

Fifty-two patients with AC and 52 healthy controls (HCs) were included in our study. Voxelwise comparisons were performed to reveal the differences in grey matter volume (GMV) and regional homogeneity (ReHo) between AC and HCs. Furthermore, region of interest to whole brain functional connectivity (FC) was calculated and compared between the groups. Finally, Pearson correlation coefficients were computed to reveal the association between clinical data and brain alterations. Mediation analyses were performed to investigate the path association among brain alterations and clinical measures.

Results

Three main findings were observed: (1) patients with AC exhibited a higher depression subscale of hospital anxiety and depression scale (HADS-D) score correlating with the GMV within the right medial prefrontal cortices (mPFC) compared with HCs; (2) relative to HCs, patients with AC exhibited lower ReHo within the right mPFC, which largely overlapped with the structural abnormalities; (3) the impact of pain duration on HADS-D score was mediated by ventral part of medial prefrontal cortices (vmPFC) GMV in patients with AC.

Conclusion

In summary, our current findings suggest that vmPFC alterations correlate with both the pain duration and the emotional comorbidities experienced by patients with AC. Our research provides an enhanced comprehension of the underlying mechanisms of AC, thereby facilitating the development of more effective treatment approaches for AC.

What Affects the Quality of Score Transformations? Potential Issues in True-Score Equating Using the Partial Credit Model

This simulation study investigated to what extent departures from construct similarity as well as differences in the difficulty and targeting of scales impact the score transformation when scales are equated by means of concurrent calibration using the partial credit model with a common person design. Practical implications of the simulation results are discussed with a focus on scale equating in health-related research settings. The study simulated data for two scales, varying the number of items and the sample sizes. The factor correlation between scales was used to operationalize construct similarity. Targeting of the scales was operationalized through increasing departure from equal difficulty and by varying the dispersion of the item and person parameters in each scale. The results show that low similarity between scales goes along with lower transformation precision. In cases with equal levels of similarity, precision improves in settings where the range of the item parameters is encompassing the person parameters range. With decreasing similarity, score transformation precision benefits more from good targeting. Difficulty shifts up to two logits somewhat increased the estimation bias but without affecting the transformation precision. The observed robustness against difficulty shifts supports the advantage of applying a true-score equating methods over identity equating, which was used as a naive baseline method for comparison. Finally, larger sample size did not improve the transformation precision in this study, longer scales improved only marginally the quality of the equating. The insights from the simulation study are used in a real-data example.

The psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the Sudanese healthcare workers in quarantine centers: a cross-sectional study 2020–2021

Background

After its emergence in Wuhan in December 2019, the COVID-19 virus disseminated around the globe creating an incredible panic and outweighing the healthcare system’s capacities. As a result of this hazardous situation, healthcare workers were placed at an unprecedented challenge making them vulnerable to a wide spectrum of mental health issues including anxiety and depression. This was a cross-sectional health facility-based study aiming to explore the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on Sudanese healthcare workers in COVID-19 treatment centers. Convenience sampling was applied. And two-part self-administered online questionnaire was used: the first part consisted of the demographic data and concerns related to COVID-19, and the second part consisted of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) standardized questionnaire. Ethical clearance was obtained from the Ministry of Health.

Results

One-hundred thirty-three healthcare workers of different job titles were enrolled in this study. A total of 54% were females, and 46% were males. Most of the participants had borderline depression (44%) or anxiety scores (47%). Females had significantly a higher mean anxiety score than males. There was no significant difference between participants with and without chronic disease on both anxiety and depression scores.

Conclusions

Healthcare workers at the forefront of the fight against COVID-19 pandemic are facing critical mental health challenges. An immediate intervention from the decision-makers is needed to mitigate this deleterious impact and to strengthen the healthcare system’s capacity in the face of healthcare emergencies in general.

Correlations of social isolation and anxiety and depression symptoms among patients with breast cancer of Heilongjiang province in China: The mediating role of social support

Objectives

To explore the correlations among social isolation and symptoms of anxiety and depression among patients with breast cancer in China and to further verify the mediating role of social support in social isolation and symptoms of depression or anxiety.

Design

A cross‐sectional survey.

Settings

The cluster sampling method was conducted for 456 female inpatients diagnosed with breast cancer at the Tumor Hospital Affiliated of Harbin Medical University from April 2019–September 2019.

Methods

Pearson correlation analysis was used for identifying correlations among all the variables. Mediation effect analysis was used to examine the role of social support in social isolation and symptoms of depression or anxiety.

Results

The results showed a prevalence of 73.26% and 70.44% for anxiety and depression symptoms in patients with breast cancer, respectively. Anxiety was significantly negatively correlated with social support (r = −.334, p < .01) and significantly positively correlated with social isolation (r = .369, p < .01). Similarly, depression was significantly negatively correlated with social support (r = −.289, p < .01) and significantly positively correlated with social isolation (r = .466, p < .01). Social support played a mediating role in social isolation and f symptoms of anxiety or depression among these patients.

Conclusions

Social isolation was positively correlated with symptoms of anxiety and depression in patients with breast cancer, respectively. Social support for patients with breast cancer has a mediating effect on the patients’ social isolation and symptoms of anxiety and depression. Therefore, the support of family, friends, hospitals, and organizations plays a positive role in reducing social isolation as well as symptoms of depression and anxiety in these patients.

Validation of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale and the Perceived Stress Scale and psychological features in patients with periodontitis

BACKGROUND

To investigate the psychometric properties of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) and 10-item Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10) in patients with periodontitis and to evaluate the psychological features of patients with periodontitis.

METHODS

Overall, 460 individuals with periodontitis were enrolled. The HADS and the PSS-10 were administered to all patients. Methodology testing included the exploratory factor analysis, the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), test-retest reliability, as well as internal consistency.

RESULTS

Regarding the CFA results of the HADS, as well as the PSS-10, a bifactor model fitted the data best. The Cronbach alpha value, as well as the intra-class correlation coefficients value of the two measures were all >0.70. The anxiety, depression, distress manifestations, and moderate-to-high perceived stress prevalence were 35.2%, 18.2%, 24.6%, and 43.9%, respectively. Severity of periodontitis, age, smoking, and disease comorbidities were identified as independent prognosticators of the presence of psychological manifestations in periodontitis.

CONCLUSION

The HADS and the PSS-10 can be used as general measures for psychological assessment in patients with periodontitis.

Psychometric Properties and Factor Structure of the Chinese Version of the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale in People Living With HIV

The population of people living with HIV (PLWH) is growing in number and usually results in mental health problems that impact their quality of life. Therefore, valid instruments and screening methods for psychological disorders are of great significance. The Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale (HADS) reveals good psychometric properties, but shows ambiguous results in factor structure. This study aims to evaluate psychometric properties in terms of the internal reliability and structure validity of the Chinese version of the HADS (C-HADS) in a large sample of PLWH in China. The C-HADS was administered to 4,102 HIV-infected adults at an HIV clinic in China. Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) and confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) were performed to examine the factor structure. Measurement invariance was assessed across gender and course of infection. Internal reliability was also assessed. A bifactor model with anomalous loadings of items 7, 8, and 10 fits the data best and holds measurement invariance across gender and course of infection. Internal reliability was good with all Cronbach's alphas > 0.70 and Spearman's ρ between 0.30 and 0.70. The C-HADS has good psychometric properties in terms of internal reliability and structure validity of a bifactor model. The C-HADS is recommended to be used as a total scale that measures general psychological distress, instead of anxiety and depression separately, when applied to PLWH. Further studies are needed to evaluate criterion validity, the cutoff score, and the effect of wording and scoring of the HADS.