ABSTRACT
Objective To investigate the validity and reliability of the Chinese version HCL-32(CV-HCL-32) in the patients with bipolar disorder(BP) and the best cut-off between the patients with BP and patients with major depression disorder (unipolar depression disorder, UP). Methods The English version HCL-32 was translated into Chinese version after the agreement of the author of the HCL-32. 300 consecutive patients with BP and 156 consecutive patients with UP in outpatients and inpatients departments diagnostically interviewed with DSM-Ⅳ were rated by CV-HCL-32. The test-retest reliability with interval of eight to fourteen days was investigated in 155 patients (51.7%) with BP in the bipolar patients. Results A two-factor solution was preferred by the factors analysis. The Eigenvalues of the two factors were 6.32, 3.00 respectively. The two factors together accounted for 29.1% of the total variance. The internal consistency( Cronbach's alpha) of the CV-HCL-32 was 0.86.The test-retest reliability of the CV-HCL-32 was 0.62(P＜ 0.01 ). The frequency of positive responses to various items ranged from 11.6% to 89.7%. The mean score of CV-HCL-32 was statistically higher in patients with BP( 16.6 ± 6.2) than that of UP ( 10.9 ± 6.4). A CV-HCL-32 screening score of 14 was chosen as the optimal cutoff between the patients with BP and UP, as it provided good sensitivity (0.74) and specificity (0.66). The positive and negative predictive power for this cut-off was 0.81 and 0.57. Conclusions The study demonstrated the suitable validity and reliability of CV-HCL-32, suggested that the CV-HCL-32 is useful questionnaire for screening bipolar disorder in China.