• Daniel Shalev, Melissa Patterson, Yasemin Aytaman, Manuel A Moya-Tapia, Craig D Blinderman, Milagros D Silva, and M Carrington Reid.
• Division of Geriatrics and Palliative Medicine, Weill Cornell Medicine (D.S., M.D.S., M.C.R.), New York, New York, USA. Electronic address: Das2043@med.cornell.edu.
• J Pain Symptom Manage. 2023 Jan 1; 65 (1): e7e13e7-e13.

BackgroundDepression is common in the palliative care setting and impacts outcomes. Operationalized screening is unusual in palliative care.Local ProblemLack of operationalized depression screening at two ambulatory palliative care sites.MethodsA fellow-driven quality improvement initiative to implement operationalized depression screening using the patient health questionnaire-2 (PHQ-2). The primary measure was rate of EMR-documented depression screening. Secondary measures were clinician perspectives on the feasibility and acceptability of implementing the PHQ-2.InterventionThe intervention is a clinic-wide implementation of PHQ-2 screening supported by note templates, brief clinician training, referral resources for clinicians, and opportunities for indirect psychiatric consultation.ResultsOperationalized depression screening rates increased from 2% to 38%. All clinicians felt incorporation of depression screening was useful and feasible.ConclusionsOperationalized depression screening is feasible in ambulatory palliative care workflow, though optimization through having screening be completed prior to clinician visit might improve uptake.Copyright © 2022 American Academy of Hospice and Palliative Medicine. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

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