The mental health establishment has collectively called on the government not to drop the indicators measuring how GPs treat depression.
The Quality Outcomes Framework is a public - if not particularly accessible - database where GPs are scored against twenty common clinical areas, from heart disease to smoking.
The National Institute for Clinical Excellence has recommended their 'retirement' as of 2012 because they were a pretty ineffective guide for patients. Unlike say heart disease, for example, the depression indicators did not cover types of treatment offered or ill-heath rates.
NICE admits in its Depression guidance that diagnosis of depression is a lottery, being based on the ability of GPs to detect emotional distress in their patients inside a ten minute consultation time. Only 39% of patients with depression are recognised as such, 'mainly because most of such patients are consulting for a somatic [i.e. physical] symptom and do not consider themselves mentally unwell, despite the presence of depression.'
According to the latest Health and Safety Executive figures, 57% of work-related absences certified by GPs were for mental ill-health. In an article for the Guardian, a GP reported that up to 50% of consultations were taken up with cases of depression and anxiety.
With depression now topping the list of all work-related illnesses, it is time for businesses and government to increase monitoring of this silent condition, and not quietly ignore it.
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