PHQ Screeners is a free, open-access resource maintained by Pfizer that provides the full suite of Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ) and Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD-7) screening instruments. These instruments were developed by Drs. Robert L. Spitzer, Janet B.W. Williams, and Kurt Kroenke with an educational grant from Pfizer and are widely used in primary care and mental health settings globally. The core value proposition is the unrestricted, no-cost access to clinically validated tools for diagnosing, monitoring, and measuring the severity of common mental health disorders.
Key Benefits and Capabilities
- Unrestricted Access: All screeners and their translations are downloadable and can be reproduced, translated, displayed, or distributed without permission or copyright restriction.
- Clinical Validation: The instruments (e.g., PHQ-9, GAD-7) are extensively validated and recognized as standard measures by organizations like the NHS, US Department of Defense, and the Veterans Administration.
- Multilingual Support: The screeners are available in nearly 80 languages, promoting broader usage and improved patient care across diverse populations.
- Severity Measurement: Tools like the PHQ-9 not only aid in diagnosis but also serve as symptom severity trackers to monitor treatment effectiveness.
Target Users and Use Cases
- Target Users: Primary care physicians, nurses, mental health professionals, researchers, public health departments, and integrated healthcare systems.
- Use Cases:
- Routine screening for depression (PHQ-9) and anxiety (GAD-7) in clinical settings.
- Monitoring the severity of a patient's symptoms over time.
- Facilitating provisional diagnosis of mental health disorders in primary care.
- Research and large-scale population studies on mental health prevalence.