The psychometric properties of the 10-item Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10) in Canadian military personnel

PLoS One. 2018 Apr 26;13(4):e0196562. doi: 10.1371/journal.pone.0196562. eCollection 2018.

Abstract

The psychometric properties of the ten-item Kessler Psychological Distress scale (K10) have been extensively explored in civilian populations. However, documentation of its psychometric properties in military populations is limited, and there is no universally accepted cut-off score on the K10 to distinguish clinical vs. sub-clinical levels of distress. The objective of this study was to examine the psychometric properties of the K10 in Canadian Armed Forces personnel. Data on 6700 Regular Forces personnel were obtained from the 2013 Canadian Forces Mental Health Survey. The internal consistency and factor structure of the K10 (range, 0-40) were examined using confirmatory factor analysis (CFA). Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) analysis was used to select optimal cut-offs for the K10, using the presence/absence of any of four past-month disorders as the outcome (posttraumatic stress disorder, major depressive episode, generalized anxiety disorder, and panic disorder). Cronbach's alpha (0.88) indicated a high level of internal consistency of the K10. Results from CFA indicated that a single-factor 10-item construct had an acceptable overall fit: root mean square error of approximation (RMSEA) = 0.05; 90% confidence interval (CI):0.05-0.06, comparative fit index (CFI) = 0.99, Tucker-Lewis Index (TLI) = 0.99, weighted root mean square residual (WRMR) = 2.06. K10 scores were strongly associated with both the presence and recency of all four measured disorders. The area under the ROC curve was 0.92, demonstrating excellent predictive value for past-30-day disorders. A K10 score of 10 or greater was optimal for screening purposes (sensitivity = 86%; specificity = 83%), while a score of 17 or greater (sensitivity = 53%; specificity = 97%) was optimal for prevalence estimation of clinically significant psychological distress, in that it resulted in equal numbers of false positives and false negatives. Our results suggest that K10 scale has satisfactory psychometric properties for use as a measure of non-specific psychological distress in the military population.

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't

MeSH terms

  • Adult
  • Area Under Curve
  • Canada
  • Depressive Disorder, Major / diagnosis
  • Female
  • Humans
  • Male
  • Mental Disorders / diagnosis
  • Middle Aged
  • Military Personnel / psychology*
  • Psychiatric Status Rating Scales*
  • ROC Curve
  • Sensitivity and Specificity
  • Stress, Psychological*
  • Surveys and Questionnaires
  • Young Adult

Grants and funding

The authors received funding for this work from the Canadian Department of National Defence via salary support and from research contract W7714–145967 with the Canadian Institute of Military and Veteran Health Research and the University of Ottawa. This work was also partly supported by the Canada Research Chairs Program (Dr. Ian Colman). The Department of National Defence provided all funding for the collection of data for the military population by Statistics Canada. The funders had no role in study design, data collection and analysis, decision to publish, or preparation of the manuscript.