Depression
Geriatric Depression Scale — 15-item short form
Depressive symptom screening in older adults; requires clinical assessment
Reference information · Questionnaire
- Last content update
- 2026-10-26
- Clinical review
- Not independently reviewed
- Source jurisdiction
- See individual sources
- Coverage
- Questionnaire
| Field | Instrument context |
|---|---|
| Version | Stanford original English GDS-15; Sheikh and Yesavage 1986 |
| Population | Older adults |
| Respondent | Self-report |
| Recall period | Past week |
| Purpose | Depressive symptom screening in older adults; requires clinical assessment |
Assessment tool
A total does not establish individual item responses.
Choose the best answer for how you have felt over the past week:
GDS-15: Sheikh and Yesavage; public-domain original English form.
Responses stay in this page’s memory. Reset or leave the page to clear them. No patient identifiers are collected.
Interpretation & limitations
- The developer recommends careful interview for scores above 5. This screening result does not establish a diagnosis.
- This implementation requires all 15 answers; it does not estimate missing responses.
- Use clinical context, communication ability and cognitive status when interpreting responses.
- No automatic diagnosis, medication change or declaration of safety.
References · 3
- Developer original English short form
- Developer scoring key
- Developer permissions and clinical context · Developer states the original scale is public domain due to Federal support.