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Diagnosis of depression. Part 4
The importance of correct and timely diagnosis of any disease is difficult to overestimate, because sometimes a person’s life directly depends on it. The importance of identifying depression at an early, initial stage is also undeniable. Very often this complex mental disorder is confused with a banal decrease in mood, sadness, pessimism, laziness. Many people prefer not to notice or not to attach importance to these symptoms, hoping that everything will go away on its own. While depression consumes a person more and more, which means treating this disease will require even more time and effort. It will take months, and maybe even years, of therapy (including medication) and rehabilitation, and the attending physician will no longer be a psychotherapist, but a psychiatrist.
Primary diagnosis of depression
To assess the form and severity of depression, clinical scales are used (special questionnaires to clarify the symptoms that the patient has). For example, the scales of Hamilton, Tsung, Beck, Zang, the Eysenck method (self-assessment of states ), etc. Today these scales in the form of tests can be found on the Internet and you can answer the questions yourself.
For example, the Zung scale was developed for self-assessment of depression and contains 20 questions.
