Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2022 Jun;12(6):e2614.
doi: 10.1002/brb3.2614. Epub 2022 May 19.

Maternal major depression disorder misclassification errors: Remedies for valid individual- and population-level inference

Arthur H Owora  1
Affiliations

Maternal major depression disorder misclassification errors: Remedies for valid individual- and population-level inference

Arthur H Owora. Brain Behav. 2022 Jun.

Abstract

Individual and population level inference about risk and burden of MDD, particularly maternal MDD, is often made using case-finding tools that are imperfect and prone to misclassification error (i.e. false positives and negatives). These errors or biases are rarely accounted for and lead to inappropriate clinical decisions, inefficient allocation of scarce resources, and poor planning of maternal MDD prevention and treatment interventions. The argument that the use of existing maternal MDD case-finding instruments results in misclassification errors is not new; in fact, it has been argued for decades, but by and large its implications and particularly how to correct for these errors for valid inference is unexplored. Correction of the estimates of maternal MDD prevalence, case-finding tool sensitivity and specificity is possible and should be done to inform valid individual and population-level inferences.

Keywords: MDD case-finding tools; inference; maternal MDD; misclassification error.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

Arthur H. Owora (author) has no conflict of interest to declare.

Similar articles

See all similar articles

References

    1. Allister, L. , Lester, B. M. , Carr, S. , & Liu, J. (2001). The effects of maternal depression on fetal heart rate response to vibroacoustic stimulation. Developmental Neuropsychology, 20(3), 639–651. 10.1207/s15326942dn2003_6 - DOI - PubMed
    1. American Psychiatric Association . (2000). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (4th Text Revision ed.). APA.
    1. Ammerman, R. T. , Putnam, F. W. , Bosse, N. R. , Teeters, A. R. , & Van Ginkel, J. B. (2010). Maternal depression in home visitation: a systematic review. Aggress Violent Behav, 15(3), 191–200. 10.1016/j.avb.2009.12.002 - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Birmaher, B. , Ryan, N. D. , Williamson, D. E. , Brent, D. A. , Kaufman, J. , Dahl, R. E. , Petrel, J. , & Nelson, B. (1996). Childhood and adolescent depression: a review of the past 10 years. Part I. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 35(11), 1427–1439. 10.1097/00004583-199611000-00011 - DOI - PubMed
    1. Burke, K. , Burke, J. D. , Jr, R. , D, S. , & Regier, D. A. (1991). Comparing age at onset of major depression and other psychiatric disorders by birth cohorts in five us community populations. Archives of General Psychiatry, 48(9), 789–795. 10.1001/archpsyc.1991.01810330013002 - DOI - PubMed

LinkOut - more resources