Moderators of Outcome in Problem-Solving Therapy for Depression in Primary Care.

Abstract

The purpose of this study was to conduct a secondary analysis of data from trials of problem-solving therapy in primary care (PST-PC) to examine differential outcomes by gender or race-ethnicity. The participants were 352 patients with depression treated with PST-PC in multiple primary care sites in the United States. Women's depressive symptoms improved more over time than men's. Hopkins Symptom Checklist depression scale scores decreased significantly (t=-10.12, df=692, p<0.001) (estimate=-0.02, 95% confidence interval=-0.03, -0.02). Although patients from racial-ethnic minority groups had more depressive symptoms over time than patients from nonminority groups, there was no evidence of differential change by racial-ethnic group. These data add to the literature supporting the usefulness of PST-PC without evidence of differential effects for patients from racial-ethnic minority or nonminority groups.