Table 1. Indicators of Depression and Age-Standardized Demographic and Health Characteristics by History of Depression Among 187 441 Women Participating in the NHS (1996) and NHS II (1997).

Indicator or Characteristic	Women, %a
	Without History of Depression (n = 140 654)	With History of Depressionb (n = 46 787)
Indicator of depression
Depression diagnosis only	0	3.6
Depressive symptoms only (MHI-5 score <60)	0	48.9
Antidepressant use only	0	23.9
Depression diagnosis and depressive symptoms	0	1.4
Depression diagnosis and antidepressant use	0	2.8
Depressive symptoms and antidepressant use	0	17.1
Depression diagnosis, depressive symptoms, and antidepressant use	0	2.3
Demographic and health factor
Age, mean (SD), y	52.3 (11.7)	48.5 (10.1)
Nonwhite	7.4	6.4
Menarche before age 10 y	6.6	7.5
BMI, mean (SD)	26.1 (5.5)	27.0 (6.2)
Income <$60 000	49.3	51.5
Oral contraceptive use ever	69.2	72.5
Exercise ≥10 metabolic equivalents/wk	48.2	43.1
Alcohol consumption
None	24.2	24.4
>0 and <5 g/d	47.1	47.9
≥5 g/d	25.7	25.6
Smoking
Never	56.9	50.7
Past	32.6	34.9
Current	10.5	14.4
Menopause and hormone use
Premenopausal	47.4	45.6
Postmenopausal and no hormone use	15.3	12.7
Postmenopausal and hormone use	33.3	38.7
Region of residency
Northeast	42.3	40.0
Midwest	25.6	26.4
South	17.7	19.2
West	14.4	14.5

Abbreviations: BMI, body mass index (calculated as weight in kilograms divided by height in meters squared); MHI-5, 5-item Mental Health Inventory; NHS, Nurses’ Health Study.

^aValues are standardized to the age distribution of the study population. Values of polytomous variables may not sum to 100% owing to rounding.

^bWomen were considered to have a history of depression if, by 1996 or 1997, they had reported regular antidepressant use, received a diagnosis of depression, or had an MHI-5 score of less than 60.