Background: Major depressive disorder (MDD) is recognized as one of the most common and debilitating diseases worldwide, corresponding to 5.8% of the total years lost due to disability (YLD) across all diseases (World Health Organization, 2018). The lifetime prevalence of MDD is approximately 17% of the population, which results in tremendous secondary costs to society (Kessler et al., 2005Greenberg et al., 2015; Wang et al., 2003) (ranked third in global burden of disease (Mrazek et al., 2014)). It is important that high standards of care and treatments are followed when treating patients with MDD to achieve best possible outcomes for patients, their families and society. It is envisaged that better standards of care will reduce the financial burden of MDD on society.

Objectives: This session aims to describe the check for compliance with Section two – MDD of Royal Australian and New Zealand College of Psychiatrists’ (RANZCP’s) Clinical Practice Guidelines for Mood Disorder (Mahli et al., 2015) at the Gold Coast Mental Health and Specialist Service (GC MHSS).

Methods: The participants would be selected in a stratified manner from a list of all patients treated at the GC MHSS aged 18 years and older with a diagnosis of MDD during 1 January 2016 to 31 March 2018. The data will be analysed using both quantitative and descriptive methods.

Findings: The initial audit cycle data collection has been completed and it is expected that the data analysis and implementation of the recommendations will be completed prior to RANZCP Congress 2019.

Conclusions: Recommendations for improvement of care will be generated following discussion of findings in various forums. An implementation strategy will be generated of key recommendations and a re-audit will be carried out within a year to measure change in practice. We envisage that this will improve standards of care for patients treated for MDD at the GC MHSS.