Prevalence of depression and diabetes: a population‐based study from rural Bangladesh

AIMS: To determine the extent of depressive symptoms in a rural community of Bangladesh and its association with newly recognized diabetes. METHODS: Depressive symptoms were assessed in 184 newly diagnosed diabetic subjects and 768 randomly selected individuals without diabetes. The Montogomery and Aasberg Depression Rating Scale (MADRS) was used to assess depressive symptoms. A structured interview was performed to obtain socio-demographic and economic information and anthropometric measures were collected. Fasting plasma glucose was measured by the HemoCue glucose analyser. RESULTS: Twenty-nine percent of male and 30.5% of female participants with diabetes and 6.0% of male and 14.6% of female subjects without diabetes had depressive symptoms rating > or = 20 on the MADRS. An association between depressive symptoms and diabetes…