Clinicians should regularly screen patients with coronary heart disease for depression because effective depression treatment may improve health outcomes, according to a science advisory from the American Heart Association (AHA).
The advisory, issued September 29 and endorsed by the American Psychiatric Association, provides easy screening tools to rapidly assess patients for depression or depressionlike symptoms and offers suggestions for referral of patients to begin depression treatment (Lichtman JH et al. Circulation. 2008;118[17]:1768-1775).