I am looking for information regarding depression in the renal patient. As
the Nurse Manager I am looking to put a Quality Assurance program together
and have been unable to find any information. Please reply with any
suggestions.

Depression is a very common problem experienced by renal patients with the serious consequences of increased morbidity and mortality. Paul Kimmel, MD has researched, published, and presented extensively on depression, its incidence, and its consequences.

Several surveys measure depression. Some have been designed specifically for this purpose alone such as the Beck Cognitive Depression Inventory. Other health-related quality of life surveys such as the MOS SF-36, the Kidney Disease Quality of Life, the Dartmouth COOP Charts, the Duke Health Profiles provide information on emotional well-being.

For articles on depression and how to evaluate depression, you might want to look at the Encouragement and/or Evaluation bibliographies on Life Options Rehabilitation Program's Web site at http://www.lifeoptions.org. You can find articles on depression and ESRD or articles by Dr. Kimmel and his colleagues on depression through the National Library of Medicine's free PubMed web site at http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/PubMed/.
Finally, the Life Options Rehabilitation Program offers several free booklets, videotapes, and audiotapes to help patients gain more knowledge about and control over their illness and to begin to look at living their lives with dialysis rather than living their lives around dialysis. You can order booklets through the Life Options Web site or by calling (800) 468-7777.