Development of scales to screen for eight common psychiatric disorders

The present study was designed to create a group of scales from the items on the Symptom Checklist 90 (SCL-90) to identify common psychiatric diagnoses. Subjects were 1457 adult psychiatric outpatients who completed the Symptom Checklist-90 and a structured diagnostic interview at the time of their initial evaluation. A combination of rational and empirical test construction methods was used to create the SCL-90 Diagnostic Scales, item sets that identify eight common psychiatric conditions: major depression, bipolar disorder, schizophrenia, antisocial personality disorder, somatization disorder, obsessive-compulsive disorder, panic disorder, and agoraphobia. These specially constructed scales were found to possess good internal reliability. These scales were also shown to differentiate patients positive for each of the eight psychiatric disorders from other psychiatric patients who did not have that disorder. Sensitivities and specificities are reported for each item set. In addition to their utility at the time of initial assessment as an aid in identifying diagnosis, the SCL-90 Diagnostic Scales may have other potential uses, such as in monitoring the symptom course of the patient's disorder or disorders over time.