A new depression scale designed for use with adults with mental retardation.

A sample of 51 mentally retarded adults with DSM-III-R criteria for depressive disorders, and 41 without depressive disorders but a high rate of other psychiatric disorders were rated on 27 items from the Comprehensive Psychopathological Rating Scale (CPRS). The newly developed CPRS depression subscale consists of nine items which can also be assessed in almost all of the people with severe or profound mental retardation in the sample. The scale is able to distinguish between depressive and non-depressive cases, and between subgroups of depression. The two factors derived from factor analysis were open to clear interpretation.