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Jay M. Cudrin, PhD
Connecticut Alcohol and Drug Abuse Commission Blue Hills Hospital 51 Coventry St Hartford, CT 06112

Arch Gen Psychiatry. 1989;46(11):1054.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text PDF and any section headings.

To the Editor.—

In their article in the February issue of the ARCHIVES comparing male and female cocaine abusers, Griffen et al¹ use scores on the Hamilton Depression Rating Scale (HDRS)² to conclude that males recover more rapidly from depression. They say that while HDRS scores for both groups drop significantly during the first 2 weeks of inpatient treatment, the continued decrease during the next 2 weeks is greater for male abusers.

Unfortunately, the HDRS does not have differential norms for men and women so we really do not know when each group maximizes its therapeutic potential. A prominent psychological test, the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory,³ shows though that, on average, women typically get higher scores on its Depression scale than men.

If this is equally true for the HDRS (which, according to the reference article,² has no norms at all and, therefore, no base rates), . . . [Full Text PDF of this Article]

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