TY - JOUR
T1 - Variability between psychiatrists on domains of the mental status examination
AU - Blaabjerg, Esben Schäfer
AU - Hemmingsen, Ralf Peter Arnfred
AU - Høegh, Erica
AU - Wang, August Gabriel
AU - Gefke, Maria
AU - Arnfred, Sidse
PY - 2020/5
Y1 - 2020/5
N2 -
Background: The Mental Status Examination (MSE) is a core element of the psychiatric assessment. To investigate the current level of psychopathological knowledge, the reliability of the MSE can be used as a proxy as it is based on descriptive psychopathology.
Methods: Three psychiatrists wrote their MSE based on 27 video recordings. The variability and inter-rater agreement were evaluated using an agreement scale from 1 to 5, made by several psychiatrists. The agreement was analysed by mean values, stratified mean values and Cronbach's alpha.
Results: The total agreement had a Cronbach's alpha of 0.87 (
p ?<?0.000). The grand mean of variability was 4.1 (SD = 0.8). The domains with the highest variability were
Attitude (Est. = 3.5, SD = 0.9),
Affect (Est. = 3.8, SD = 0.8) and
Motor activity (3.7, SD = 0.9). The videos with the highest variability were #2 (Est.=3.3, SD = 1,1) and #21 (Est. = 3.6, SD = 1.1).
Conclusions: The overall reliability of the MSE based on Cronbach's alpha was good and the mean variability was low. This indicates that the MSE performed by three psychiatrists is reliable. The main reason for variability was due to individual interpretation and discrepancies in literature. The literature-driven variability could possibly be reduced by approaching national tradition to international practise. The individual variability maybe reduced by increasing the opportunities for clinical group rating.
AB -
Background: The Mental Status Examination (MSE) is a core element of the psychiatric assessment. To investigate the current level of psychopathological knowledge, the reliability of the MSE can be used as a proxy as it is based on descriptive psychopathology.
Methods: Three psychiatrists wrote their MSE based on 27 video recordings. The variability and inter-rater agreement were evaluated using an agreement scale from 1 to 5, made by several psychiatrists. The agreement was analysed by mean values, stratified mean values and Cronbach's alpha.
Results: The total agreement had a Cronbach's alpha of 0.87 (
p ?<?0.000). The grand mean of variability was 4.1 (SD = 0.8). The domains with the highest variability were
Attitude (Est. = 3.5, SD = 0.9),
Affect (Est. = 3.8, SD = 0.8) and
Motor activity (3.7, SD = 0.9). The videos with the highest variability were #2 (Est.=3.3, SD = 1,1) and #21 (Est. = 3.6, SD = 1.1).
Conclusions: The overall reliability of the MSE based on Cronbach's alpha was good and the mean variability was low. This indicates that the MSE performed by three psychiatrists is reliable. The main reason for variability was due to individual interpretation and discrepancies in literature. The literature-driven variability could possibly be reduced by approaching national tradition to international practise. The individual variability maybe reduced by increasing the opportunities for clinical group rating.
KW - descriptive psychopathology
KW - Mental status examination
KW - observer rating scales
KW - reliability
KW - Mental status examination
KW - descriptive psychopathology
KW - observer rating scales
KW - reliability
KW - Reproducibility of Results
KW - Mental Disorders/diagnosis
KW - Humans
KW - Middle Aged
KW - Male
KW - Video Recording/methods
KW - Young Adult
KW - Mental Status and Dementia Tests/standards
KW - Aged, 80 and over
KW - Adult
KW - Female
KW - Aged
KW - Psychiatry/methods
KW - Observer Variation
U2 - 10.1080/08039488.2019.1703038
DO - 10.1080/08039488.2019.1703038
M3 - Article
C2 - 31852322
SN - 0803-9488
VL - 74
SP - 287
EP - 292
JO - Nordic Journal of Psychiatry
JF - Nordic Journal of Psychiatry
IS - 4
ER -