The Research Diagnostic Criteria (RDC) are a collection of influential
psychiatric
Psychiatry is the medical specialty devoted to the diagnosis, prevention, and treatment of mental disorders. These include various maladaptations related to mood, behaviour, cognition, and perceptions. See glossary of psychiatry.
Initial psy ...
diagnostic criteria published in late 1970s under auspices of Statistics Section NY Psychiatric Institute, authors were Spitzer, R L; Endicott J; Robins E. PMID 1153649.
[Spitzer RL, Robins E (1978)]
Research diagnostic criteria: rationale and reliability
Archives of General Psychiatry, vol. 35, no6, pp. 773–82 As psychiatric diagnoses widely varied especially between the US and Europe, the purpose of the criteria was to allow diagnoses to be consistent in psychiatric research.
Some of the criteria were based on the earlier
Feighner Criteria The Feighner Criteria are a set of influential psychiatric diagnostic criteria developed at Washington University in St. Louis between the late 1950s to the early 1970s.
The criteria are named after a psychiatric paper published in 1972 of which J ...
, although many new disorders were included; "The historical record shows that the small group of individuals who created the Feighner criteria instigated a paradigm shift that has had profound effects on the course of American and, ultimately, world psychiatry."
The Development of the Feighner Criteria: A Historical Perspective
Kenneth S. Kendler, M.D.; Rodrigo A. Muñoz, M.D.; George Murphy, M.D. Am J Psychiatry 2009;167:134–142. 10.1176/appi.ajp.2009.09081155
The RDC is important in the history of psychiatric diagnostic criteria as the DSM-III
The ''Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders'' (DSM; latest edition: DSM-5-TR, published in March 2022) is a publication by the American Psychiatric Association (APA) for the classification of mental disorders using a common langu ...
was based on many of the RDC descriptions, head of DSM III Edition was R L Spitzer.[Spitzer RL (1989)]
Commentary on RDC by Robert Spitzer
Current Contents, vol. 32, no19, p21
See also
*Diagnostic classification and rating scales used in psychiatry
Diagnosis is the identification of the nature and cause of a certain phenomenon. Diagnosis is used in many different disciplines, with variations in the use of logic, analytics, and experience, to determine " cause and effect". In systems engin ...
*Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia The Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia (SADS)The SADS is not available via the major psychological test companies, but must be obtained directly from one of its coauthors, Jean Endicott, PhD, Professor of Clinical Psychology (in Psyc ...
References
{{reflist, 2
Psychiatric research
Classification of mental disorders