Clinical Depression Versus Distress Among Patients With Type 2 Diabetes: Not Just a Question of Semantics
Response to Fisher et al.
- Norbert Hermanns, PHD1,
- Thomas Kubiak, PHD1,
- Berndhard Kulzer, PHD2 and
- Thomas Haak, MD1
- 1Research Institute of the Diabetes Academy Mergentheim (FIDAM), Bad Mergentheim, Germany
- 2Department of Psychology, University of Greifswald, Greifswald, Germany
- Address correspondence to Norbert Hermanns, PhD, Research Institute of the Diabetes Academy Mergentheim, Postfach 1144 Bad Mergentheim D-97961, Germany. E-mail: hermanns{at}diabetes-zentrum.de
We read with interest the recent article by Fisher et al. (1) that concluded that subthreshold de-pression could be regarded as a proxy marker of diabetes-related distress rather than a proxy marker of clinical depression. Fisher et al. support their conclusion by referring to two key findings of their study. Their first finding was a markedly higher correlation between diabetes-related distress and the intensity of depressive symptoms than that between diabetes-related distress and clinical depression. Their second finding was significant associations between subthreshold …
