Getting the Best Return on Your Screening Investment: an Analysis of the Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire and Reynolds Adolescent Depression Scale

Data from 64 adolescent inpatients admitted for serious suicide ideation, 50 adolescent inpatients admitted following a suicide attempt, & 56 randomly selected high school controls were used to evaluate the Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire & the Reynolds Adolescent Depression Scale – Second Edition. The hypothesis that a combination of mean scores on the two measures & critical item scores would provide the best clinical utility was partially supported. The Suicidal Ideation Questionnaire was found to be very useful in discriminating between the study groups but the Reynolds scale did not perform as expected. The fewest false negatives would result from relying on Reynolds scale scores equal to or greater than 63 & Suicidal Ideation scores equal to or greater than 14. (39 refs.)