---
name: mental-health-assessment
description: Use when asked to administer, score, or explain a Mental Health Assessment — combined depression/anxiety screening using PHQ-9 and GAD-7 — grounded in FormExamples/form-examples; distinct from the legal/procedural mental-health-act-assessment.
---

# Mental Health Assessment

Combined depression and anxiety screening using PHQ-9 (Patient Health
Questionnaire-9) and GAD-7 (Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7), with risk
assessment.

## Scoring

**Instruments:** PHQ-9 (0–27) and GAD-7 (0–21).

- **PHQ-9:** 0–4 Minimal, 5–9 Mild, 10–14 Moderate, 15–19 Moderately
  Severe, 20–27 Severe.
- **GAD-7:** 0–4 Minimal, 5–9 Mild, 10–14 Moderate, 15–21 Severe.

## What it covers

Demographics; PHQ-9 depression screen; GAD-7 anxiety screen; mood and
affect; risk assessment; substance use; current medications; treatment
history; and social/functional status.

## Common pitfalls

- **Treating the PHQ-9/GAD-7 total score as more important than item 9
  (suicidal ideation)** — a non-zero response on the PHQ-9's
  suicidality item warrants direct follow-up regardless of the total
  score band; it shouldn't be averaged into an otherwise moderate total.
- **Screening without checking substance use context** — depression and
  anxiety symptoms can be substance-induced or worsened by substance
  use; skipping this section can misattribute the cause.
- **Confusing this with the Mental Health Act assessment** — see
  [[mental-health-act-assessment]] for the separate, legal/procedural
  detention-criteria instrument; this one is a symptom-severity
  screening tool, not a legal determination.

## Learn more

- [FormExamples: mental-health-assessment](https://github.com/FormExamples/form-examples/tree/main/forms/mental-health-assessment) for the full implementation, clinical references, and worked examples.
- [[mental-health-act-assessment]], [[psychiatry-assessment]], [[psychology-assessment]] for related mental-health assessments.