Membership of the Royal College of General Practitioners and recognition of depression in primary care.

To determine the effect of membership of the Royal College of General Practitioners (RCGP) on recognition of depression, odds ratios, Lowess-smoothed plots, and regression models were produced for recognition rates in a representative sample of 20,818 patient contacts for members and non-members of the RCGP Membership of the RCGP did not appear to convey greater ability to discriminate between depressed and non-depressed patients, but members were more likely to recognise depression in both depressed and non-depressed individuals.