Table 3.

Operating Characteristics of Geriatric Depression Scale Cut scores with Respect to Patient Suicide Ideation Status, by Sex

GDS Cut score	Total Sample				Men				Women
GDS Cut score	Sensitivity^*	Specificity	PPV	NPV	Sensitivity^‡	Specificity	PPV	NPV	Sensitivity^‖	Specificity	PPV	NPV
2	0.884	0.557	0.198	0.975	0.900	0.586	0.168	0.984	0.878	0.538	0.214	0.968
3	0.797	0.722	0.262	0.966	0.900	0.753	0.254	0.988	0.755	0.702	0.266	0.952
4	0.754	0.815	0.335	0.964	0.850	0.833	0.321	0.984	0.714	0.804	0.343	0.952
5	0.652	0.878	0.398	0.953	0.850	0.916	0.486	0.985	0.571	0.854	0.359	0.933
6	0.551	0.910	0.432	0.942	0.650	0.940	0.500	0.967	0.510	0.892	0.403	0.927

GDS-SI Cut score	Sensitivity^†	Specificity	PPV	NPV	Sensitivity^§	Specificity	PPV	NPV	Sensitivity^¶	Specificity	PPV	NPV
1	0.797	0.804	0.335	0.970	0.800	0.809	0.281	0.978	0.796	0.801	0.364	0.965
2	0.551	0.928	0.487	0.943	0.650	0.949	0.542	0.967	0.510	0.915	0.463	0.929
3	0.348	0.978	0.667	0.924	0.500	0.986	0.813	0.968	0.286	0.974	0.609	0.905

Bold numbers reflect suggested cut scores. We tested the significance of the receiver operating characteristic curves by computing the area under the curves produced by plotting sensitivity against 1 minus specificity, for suicide ideators (N = 69; 20 men and 49 women) vs non ideators (N = 557; 215 men and 342 women); AUCs were compared against a null hypothesis of 50% coverage using a Wilcoxon rank sum test.
* Area under the curve (AUC), 0.844; standard error, 0.026; 95% CI, 0.793–0.896.
† AUC, 0.834; standard error, 0.031; 95% CI, 0.774–0.894.
‡ AUC, 0.902; standard error, 0.047; 95% CI, 0.810–0.994.
§ AUC, 0.857; standard error, 0.057; 95% CI, 0.745–0.969.
‖ AUC, 0.814; standard error, 0.032; 95% CI, 0.752–0.877.
¶ AUC, 0.822; standard error, 0.036; 95% CI, 0.751–0.893.
PPV, positive predictive value; NPV, negative predictive value; GDS, Geriatric Depression Scale (α = 0.81 total; α = 0.82 for men and α = 0.80 for women); GDS-SI, 5-item Geriatric Depression Scale-Suicide Ideation screen (α = 0.68 total; α = 0.73 for men and α = 0.65 for women).