Title of Assessment
Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS)
Author(s)
J. A. Yesavage, Springer Publishing Company
Year of Publication/Publisher
1982
Identify Type of Assessment
Standardized
Questionnaire
Norm-referenced
Cost & How to Access Assessment
Free!
Short form: https://geriatrictoolkit.missouri.edu/cog/GDS_SHORT_FORM.PDF
Population
65+, brain injury recovery, Parkinson's disease, neurocognitive disorders, stroke recovery, older adults and geriatrics, non-specific patient populations.
Any geriatric individual who may be at risk for depression or experiencing signs and symptoms of depression.
Appropriate Settings
Primary care
Long-term acute care
Rehabilitation hospitals
Community settings
Home Health
Purpose of Assessment & Function(s)/Area(s) Assessed
The propose of this assessment is to look at and assesses depression and the ideation of suicide in elderly individuals of varying diagnoses
Administration
5-10 minutes to administer.
The GDS-L (long term version) is comprised of 30 yes/no questions that are self reported by the individual taking the assessment
The GDS-S (short version) has 15 yes/no questions. The short version takes approximately 5-7 minutes. These questions are randomly selected from a pool of 100.
User Qualifications
No qualifications or training required
Materials Required
GDS-L
GDS-S
Writing utensil
Scoring Procedure
Individuals receive a single point for every “incorrect” response they give based on the scoring charts. When taking the 30 question GDS-L, a score of 11 or above indicates depression. These scores are categorized as:
Normal
Mild
Moderate-Severe
Psychometrics/Standardization
GDS has a high degree of reliability and validity for detecting depression in the geriatric population when results were compared to DSM-5 criteria
Strengths & Weaknesses of Assessment
Strengths:
Translated into many languages
Not many required materials
Free and accessible
Weaknesses
Participants may not answer truthfully depending on who is proctoring assessment
References
Durmaz, B., Soysal, P., Ellidokuz, H., & Isik, A. T. (2018, September). Validity and reliability of Geriatric Depression scale-15 (short form) in Turkish older adults. Northern clinics of Istanbul. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6323561/
The Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS). HIGN. (n.d.). https://hign.org/consultgeri/try-this-series/geriatric- depression-scale-gds
Geriatric depression scale. Shirley Ryan AbilityLab. (n.d.). https://www.sralab.org/rehabilitation- measures/geriatric-depression-scale