Abstract
Depressive disorders are of high clinical and economic relevance in outpatient and inpatient care. For the treatment of depression effective measures are available. However, these methods often are not used because depressive disorders are underdetected or underestimated in their severity. To improve diagnostic and therapeutic processes in the last years different national and international organizations developed guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of depressive disorders (e. g. AHCPR, APA, German Association of Psychiatrists). These guidelines differ substantially in their goals, content, size, specifically in their methodological quality. The Association of the Scientific Medical Societies in Germany (AWMF) and the German Agency for Quality in Medicine (AQUMED) developed a checklist to evaluate the methodological quality of guidelines. This manual was used to describe and analyze the most relevant and actual six guidelines for diagnosis and treatment of depressive disorders. Recommendations for further improvement and implementation of these guidelines are given.