Opportunistic Risk Screening of Depression by Community Pharmacists: Noble Intervention to Mend the Mind during COVID-19

Abstract

Depression is the most common condition affecting the mental health of individuals. During the whole lifetime, at least one in four individuals go through an episode of this disorder. Recently, the Malaysian number of cases has increased to around 500,000 with more adding due to COVID-19 pandemic. The first professionals to detect depression by analysing the rather emotional, presenting symptoms of the patient are the family physicians. In such circumstances, how is it possible for a community pharmacist to identify undiagnosed depression? Depression is real, sadly, the silent nature of the disorder results in an increase in its unreported cases. On the bright side we believe the new screening guidelines and intervention of community pharmacists might be one noble way to aid in the opportunistic risk screening of depression and heal the hidden emotions during COVID-19.