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Archived Comments for: The relaxation exercise and social support trial-resst: study protocol for a randomized community based trial

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  1. Tool clarification : Scale for Assessment of Somatic Symptoms

    Geetha Desai, national Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences

    27 March 2012

    The article ¿the relaxation exercise and social support trial resst: study protocol for a randomized Community based trial¿ published by Kobessi et al in 2011 is a very interesting intervention study from a developing country with limited resources. The authors have assessed the common mental disorders using Hopkins checklist for anxiety and Depression. They have used Scale for Assessment of Somatic symptoms (SASS) for assessing Somatization as mentioned in the article. The authors have mentioned the scale as Patel somatisation scale 2005.

    We would like to highlight the fact this scale is used to assess the somatic symptoms which are medically unexplained and is not for diagnosis of somatisation. This scale was constructed by Chaturvedi SK in 1987 at, National Institute of Mental Health and Neurosciences, Bangalore, India. The scale further validated in studies in assessing unexplained somatic symptoms in cancer patients and Somatization disorders. (Chaturvedi et al 1987, Chaturvedi et al 1998). The above tool for assessing somatic symptoms has been used by Patel et al in three studies and the reference of this tool is mentioned as given Chaturvedi SK and Sarmukaddam et al 1987.

    Competing interests

    none

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