A Unique and Rigorous Data Platform for Depression Screening Research

2024/08/06

We are excited to share that the COVID-19 LSR team was awarded a 2-year funding ($233,000) by CIHR for “Recovering from the COVID-19 Pandemic, Informing Future Public Health Crises, and Building Global Evidence Base for Mental Health Research: A Systematic Review of COVID-19 related Mental Health.” This grant will allow our team to integrate new evidence into our comparison prior to and during COVID-19, evaluate mental health symptom trajectories across the pandemic, and conduct a meta-research review of COVID-19 mental health research to identify strengths and weaknesses in planning for ongoing mental health surveillance and future disaster preparedness. 

2024/07/29

A meta-analysis of primary studies employing the Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS-15) led by Marc Parsons and supported by DEPRESSD team members was published in Scientific Reports. Many studies use the GDS-15 to estimate depression prevalence. The team compared prevalence based on the GDS-15 to a gold-standard diagnostic test of depression. We found that the most used GDS-15 cutoff overestimated depression prevalence substantially and that the cutoff that most closely matched true prevalence provided estimates which were too heterogeneous to be useful in practice. For more information on this study, click here.

2024/07/04

An individual-patient data meta-analysis led by Nadia González Domínguez was recently published in the Journal of Clinical Epidemiology. The study aimed to estimate the minimal detectable difference of the 15-item geriatric depression scale (GDS-15). The team found that this estimate was around 3.81 points for the highest confidence level used, and was influenced by the proportion of people with major depression in a given study. Read more here.

2024/07/02

A cross-sectional SPIN Cohort study led by Afra Alkan was recently accepted for publication in Arthritis Care & Research. The study aimed to assess minimal detectable changes (MDCs) of the Health Assessment Questionnaire-Disability Index, Patient Reported Outcomes Measurement Information System-29 Profile version 2.0 domains, and Patient Health Questionnaire-8 in Systemic Sclerosis, as well as compare MDC estimates by age, sex, and SSc subtype. The team found that MDC95 estimates were not materially different across subgroups. For more information on this study, click here.

2024/05/31

We are excited to share that Amina Tasleem, our research assistant for the DEPRESSD project, has been admitted to Harvard University’s MPH program in Health Management. Amina joined the team in 2020 as an undergraduate honors thesis student at McGill University and is currently working on the DEPRESSD and COVID-19 LSR project. She will join the program in the Fall of 2024. Congratulations, Amina! 

2024/05/31

We are happy to share that Ying (Sheryl) Sun, who has been a Research Project Coordinator of our DEPRESSD and the COVID-19 LSR for the past 6 years, has been admitted to Johns Hopkins’ PhD program in Epidemiology for Fall 2024, in the Clinical Trials and Evidence Synthesis track. Congratulations, Sheryl!

2024/05/31

Dr. Yin Wu, Research Associate with the DEPRESSD, has been part of the team since 2018. She recently started a new position as a Research Professor at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University (SJTU), School of Public Health. SJTU is one of the top few universities in China, and their School of Public Health is also highly respected. Although Yin will no longer be part of the day-to-day work of the team, she will remain a member of the DEPRESSD Steering Committee, continue to play a key role in the DEPRESSD Project and collaborate as an independent professor. Congrats Yin!

2024/05/31

We’re happy to share that Diana Jiang has been admitted to McGill’s MA program in Educational Psychology (Human Development). Diana joined the DEPRESSD team as a research assistant in November 2020 and has worked on several COVID-19 LSR projects. She’ll start her program in September 2024. Congratulations Diana!

2024/03/07

Dr. Thombs was quoted in a Washington Post article on menopause and depression. Similar to our team’s work, the article scrutinizes evidence and concludes that the menopause depression link is not likely much greater than for other health conditions that people experience. Read the full article here.

2024/03/06

Congratulations to Brett who received the Alex Leighton Award from the Canadian Association of Psychiatric Epidemiology (CAPE) and the Canadian Psychiatry Association (CPA) for his work in mental health epidemiology: https://www.cpa-apc.org/awards/annual-collaborative-awards/. He will be presented with the award at November’s CPA/CAPE meeting.

2024/01/09

Meira Golberg joined the SPIN and DEPRESSD teams as a full-time Biostatistician in

January 2024. She obtained her Bachelor of Science in Mathematics and Biology at McGill University and Master of Mathematics in Biostatistics at the University of Waterloo. Meira has worked on a wide range of projects focused on measuring predictors of cognition, physical and mental well-being, mental health and unmet healthcare needs. She will be supporting the SPIN and DEPRESSD teams in their methodologic aims and associated data analyses. Read more about Meira here.

2023/10/17

Dr. Jieting (Jenny) Zhang joined the DEPRESSD team as a visiting professor in October. She is an associate professor in School of Psychology, Shenzhen University, China. Her research interests include the influence of childhood adversity on mental health and mindfulness-based interventions. Read more about Jenny here.

2023/09/12

Dr. Yin Wu and the team reviewed data contribution to the four depression screening tool accuracy individual participant data meta-analyses (IPDMAs). We found that 65% of 456 eligible studies contributed data overall; data contribution was associated with multiple characteristics of primary studies. Over 80% of 161 non-contributions were because authors were unreachable or data were unavailable. This was the largest study to investigate data contribution to IPDMAs that has examined characteristics of eligible studies and the first in the field of diagnostic test accuracy, which may support future research to promote data contribution to IPDMAs. Read more about the publication here: link.

2023/08/24

We are currently seeking applicants for a full-time analyst position. Please read here for more details.

The start date is flexible, and applications will be considered on a rolling basis.

To apply: Applicants should send (1) a cover letter, (2) a curriculum vitae, (3) an unofficial transcript, (4) a writing sample, and (5) contact information for three references to Ms. Marie-Eve Carrier (carrier.marie.eve@gmail.com).

2023/07/17

Drs Thombs and Rice, along with colleagues Dr. Sarah Markham and Dr. Roy Ziegelstein, were commissioned by the BMJ to discuss new screening recommendations from the United States Preventive Services Task Force. See the editorial here: LINK.

2023/06/26

Team members Dr. Yin Wu (moderator), Letong Li, Kexin Li and Diana Jiang (co-presenters) recently presented their symposium titled “Mental Health Intervention Effects in the General Population and Among Youth and Older Adults to Inform Management Strategies During and Post-COVID-19: Evidence from an Ongoing Living Systematic Review” at the 2023 CPA convention in Toronto. Kexin also presented her poster on loneliness among older adults during COVID-19. Congratulations to the team!

2023/06/15

Gabriel joined the DEPRESSD team as a Mitacs research intern in June 2023. She majors in global health at the University of Hong Kong, where she has worked with various research teams. Gabriel’s research interests include psychiatric epidemiology and Mendelian randomization. Read more about Gabriel here.

2023/06/08

Daniel Henao-Díaz joined the DEPRESSD team as a Mitacs intern in June 2023. He has worked as a physician after receiving his medical degree from the University of Caldas (Colombia) in 2017. Currently, Daniel is studying mathematics and physics education at the Catholic University of Manizales (Colombia). Learn more about Daniel here.

2023/05/15

Brienne Tougas joined the DEPRESSD team as a research assistant in May 2023. She is currently studying psychology at McGill, where she gained research experience in education and mental health. Brienne wants to pursue a doctoral degree in psychology and conduct research on how traumatic life events can impact mental health and well-being, particularly in youth. Read more about Brienne here.

2023/05/03

Monica D’Onofrio joined the DEPRESSD team in April as a summer Research Assistant. She completed her BSc in Physiology at McGill in December, where she worked in cancer research. She’s interested in mental health and aims to pursue a degree in clinical psychology. Read more about Monica here.

2023/04/14

Dr. Afra Alkan has joined the DEPRESSD team as a postdoctoral fellow in April. She completed her PhD in Biostatistics at Ankara University in 2022 in Ankara, Türkiye. Her research interests include evaluation of diagnostic accuracy measures, multivariate analysis, longitudinal data analysis, and R programming. Learn more about Afra here.

2023/03/09

Dr. Sarah Markham, a patient partner on our team, recently published an opinion piece in BMJ in response to our team’s latest publication titled “Comparison of mental health symptoms before and during the covid-19 pandemic: evidence from a systematic review and meta-analysis of 134 cohorts.” The article emphasized the importance of high-quality research in the field of mental health. Read the full article here.

2023/03/08

A living systematic review on COVID-19 mental health changes, led by Sheryl and co-authored by other LSR members, has been published in the BMJ. This review evaluated longitudinal studies that compared mental health outcomes prior to the pandemic and during COVID-19. The team analyzed data from 134 cohorts of people from 31 countries. They found that there are no or minimal changes in mental health among the general population and 11 subgroups (e.g., age groups, sex or gender, pre-existing medical or mental health conditions). One exception is among women for whom there were consistent negative small changes across outcome domains. The results suggest that mental health in COVID-19 is more nuanced than previously assumed and that this is largely a story of resilience. To read the paper in BMJ [LINK] and view the infographic [LINK], click on the provided links.

2023/01/31

Dr. Wu and the team compared the accuracy of the 7-item Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale Depression subscale (HADS-D) with the 14-item full scale (HADS-T) to screen for depression. In this study, 20,700 participants (2,285 major depression cases) from 98 studies were included. We found that sensitivity and specificity of the HADS-T were not superior to the HADS-D for detecting major depression. Thus, using the full 14-item HADS-T for depression screening would require additional time and patient burden without improving accuracy. Read more about the publication here: https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/36689386/.

2023/01/17

We are excited to share that Marc Parsons (McGill PhD candidate in biostatistics and DEPRESSD team member) has been granted a McGill University Health Centre Research Institute (RI-MUHC) 2023 Studentship for his proposed thesis work entitled: Using flexible regression methods to analyse depression trajectories in an individual participant data meta-analysis of pregnant and postpartum women. This studentship was awarded based on the basis of academic performance, publications, research experience, training environment, and the merits of the proposed research project.