Construction of a new psychiatric rating instrument, the Comprehensive Psychopathological Rating Scale (CPRS).

1. The CPRS (the Comprehensive Psychopathological Rating Scale) is a recently constructed rating instrument consisting of 65 scaled items, covering a wide range of psychiatric symptoms. Explicit definitions in a non-technical language are provided for items as well as scale steps. 2. The CPRS is mainly intended for evaluation of treatment effects, but due to the explicit descriptions, it has also been found useful for teaching purposes. It can be used in full, or as an item pool for which subscales for different psychiatric syndromes can be designed. Subscales exist, inter al., for depression, schizophrenia, obsessive-compulsive disorder, neurasthenic syndromes and mental distress in connection with severe physical illness. 3. The CPRS is available in parallel Swedish and English versions. It has been translated into all Scandinavian languages, and into German, Italian and Spanish. French and Russian versions are in preparation. 4. The rating is based on an interview which will require less than an hour in most cases if the scale is used in full. Due to the non-technical language used, raters without formal training in psychiatry (i.e. nurses, psychologists, general practitioners) can use the scale without reduction in reliability.