Reliability and Validity of the Greek Version of the Derogatis Psychiatric Rating Scale (DPRS)

Background : The aim of this paper is to report on the Greek version of the Derogatis Psychiatric Rating Scale (DPRS) and its validity and reliability when administered to a Greek sample. The DPRS is a clinician-rated measure of psychiatric symptoms with nine basic and eight complementary symptom dimensions and a Global Pathology Index. Method : The DPRS was translated into Greek and administered to 161 psychiatric patients and healthy volunteers. Its validity was assessed against the Semi-structured Clinical Interview (SCID) and the Symptoms Checklist-90-Revised (SCL-90-R). The inter-rater reliability and test-retest reliability were also evaluated for each symptom dimension. Results : All the symptom dimensions of the DPRS, except euphoria, have concurrent validity with the SCID on the relevant symptom dimensions diagnoses set by the interview. At the cut-off point 2/3 the DPRS has a sensitivity of 98% and a specificity of 74% in indicating active psychiatric patients. The symptom dimensions of the DPRS also have strong correlations with the relevant dimensions of SCL-90-R. The range for inter-rater reliability was from 0.48 to 0.88, the range for test-retest reliability was from 0.25 to 0.85, and the internal consistency was 0.90. Conclusion : The Greek version of the DPRS has acceptable psychometric properties, rendering it a useful screening instrument of global psychopathology as well as a multidimensional measure of some basic psychiatric symptoms.