Although depressive disorders are common conditions in primary health care service, and many depressed patients consult their general practitioners, GPs have some difficulties in the detection and correct diagnosis of depression. Unrecognized and untreated depression causes great health and economic burden and also contributes to significant suffering, therefore the correct recognition of affective disorder in GP settings is an important healthcare target. The aim of our study was to assess the prevalence of depressive disorders in general practices in Hungary and also to assess the sensitivity and specificity of different depression screening instruments.

In the present study the current prevalence of DSM-IV depressive disorders were surveyed among 984 primary care attendees in 6 GP practices in Hungary, using the Beck Depression Inventory and the PRIME-MD screening instrument.

The current prevalence rate of any PRIME-MD DSM-IV depressive disorders, including symptomatic major depressive episode, were 18.5% and 7.3% respectively. Beck Depression Inventory identified any current depressive disorders with 95% sensitivity and 56% specificity and the same figures for current symptomatic major depressive episode were 83% and 23%, respectively.

Our results are similar to those reported previously from Hungary and from other countries. The findings also indicate that the Beck Depression Inventory and PRIME-MD can help in detecting depressive disorders in primary care.