Background: Depressed primary care patients may present with somatic symptoms first, complicating differential diagnosis. Clinicians have few instruments for assessing this comorbidity.
Objective: To evaluate the psychometrics of the translated Chinese Depression and Somatic Symptoms Scale (DSSS) in Americans.
Procedures: A total of 491 nonclinical but symptomatic ethnically-diverse individuals completed the DSSS and Center for Epidemiologic Studies Depression Scale (CES-D).
Results: Factor analysis yielded 2 distinct factors: depression and somatic symptoms. DSSS and subscales showed internal consistency, reliability, and convergent validity with CES-D and subscales.
Conclusions: These results support DSSS's trustworthiness for US populations. Using DSSS for patient assessment may assist diagnosis and inform interventions.
Keywords: Comorbidity; Depression; Primary care; Psychology; Somatic symptoms; Somatization.
Copyright © 2018 Academy of Consultation-Liaison Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.