Mental Fatigue in Individuals with Psychiatric Disorders: A Scoping Review

© 2022 The Author(s). Published by Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/)Objective: The aim of this study was to complete a scoping review of the published literature describing the relationship between mental fatigue and various psychiatric disorders, in order to better understand its frequency and clinical impact, and to provide recommendations for future clinical research. Methods: A scoping review using PubMed/MEDLINE, Cochrane and PsychArticles databases was conducted using the keywords “mental fatigue”, “mental tiredness” or “mental exhaustion”, and completed in accordance with the Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis Protocols Extension for Scoping Reviews 2018 checklist. Results: We extracted 10 studies fulfilling our inclusion criteria from a total of publications. Mental fatigue was studied within mood disorders, anxiety disorders, obsessive compulsive disorder, and obsessive-compulsive personality disorder. A commonly used tool to measure mental fatigue in these samples was the Multidimensional Fatigue Inventory-20. Specific cognitive factors (unhelpful beliefs about sleep, symptom-focused rumination) and personality risk factors (harm avoidance, self directedness, cooperativeness, persistence) were relevant to predicting mental fatigue symptoms and rates of mental fatigue may vary with gender and diagnosis. Conclusion: Research into mental fatigue in adult psychiatric sample was limited to a few psychiatric disorders and requires further investigation.Peer reviewe

Validation of the Patient Health Questionnaire-9 and the Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 in Lithuanian individuals with anxiety and mood disorders

© 2023 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).The Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) and Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7) are short self-report questionnaires used to screen and assess depression and anxiety severity in medical and community samples. However, little is known about their psychometric properties in individuals with anxiety and mood disorders (AMD) This study evaluated the psychometric properties of the PHQ-9 and GAD-7 in individuals with AMD. Individuals (n = 244, mean age 39.9 ± 12.3 years) with AMD completed the PHQ-9, GAD-7, as well as other measures of depression, anxiety, and a structured diagnostic interview. The PHQ-9 and GAD-7 demonstrated good internal consistency (Cronbach's alpha 0.87 and 0.84, respectively). The PHQ-9 and GAD-7 showed a weak correlation with clinician-rated scales HAM-D and HAM-A (r = 0.316, p < 0.01, r = 0.307, p < 0.01, respectively). For the PHQ-9, a cut score of ≥11 resulted in 72% sensitivity and 72% specificity at recognizing depression symptoms. For the GAD-7, a cut score ≥7 resulted in 73% sensitivity and 54% specificity at recognizing any anxiety disorders. The confirmatory factor analysis suggested a two-factor structure (“cognitive/affectional”, “somatic”) for both the PHQ-9 and GAD-7. In conclusion, the PHQ-9 and GAD-7 have adequate formal psychometric properties as severity measures for symptoms of anxiety and depression in individuals with AMD. The PHQ-9 performs well as a screener using a cut score of ≥11. However, the clinical utility of the GAD-7 as a diagnostic tool for recognition of anxiety disorders is limited.Peer reviewe