Depressive symptomatology: We used the validated German version of the PHQ-928, a 9-item module of the Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ)29 assessing psychiatric disorders according to DSM-IV criteria. Patients are asked to rate the frequency of symptoms within the last two weeks on a four-point scale, with higher values indicating higher symptomatology. The PHQ-9 can be used categorical and as a sum score indicating overall depression severity28. Cronbachs Alpha in our study was .88.