Characteristics of patients attending the child and adolescent psychiatric outpatient clinic in Erbil city

Abstract

Background The Erbil psychiatric hospital is the major governmental psychiatric facility in the governorate of Erbil, the capital of the Kurdistan region in Iraq, providing services for the diagnosis, treatment and follow-up of patients from the city and its surrounding areas. The child and adolescent outpatient clinic in the hospital is for patients younger than 18 years. The objectives of this study were to explore the sociodemographic, pregnancy and birth characteristics, as well as the clinical profiles, of patients who presented to the child and adolescent psychiatric outpatient clinic to statistically estimate the frequency of various psychiatric disorders among the attendees and to test hypotheses of the association of these psychiatric disorders with sociodemographic and birth and pregnancy characteristics as reported by many previous studies but with inconsistent results. Methods A descriptive consecutive cross-sectional study was conducted from October 2017 to February 2018 in the Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Outpatient Clinic in Erbil province of Iraq’s Kurdistan region. The diagnostic criteria of the DSM-5 (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5 th edition) were implemented. Chi-square tests were used to test the hypothesized associations. Results Of a total of 207 patients, 142 were males and 65 were females, and most lived in low socioeconomic status. Most of the patients’ fathers were school educated, and most mothers were illiterate. Consanguinity was found in 41% of the parents, 26.6% of the patients were born by caesarean section(C/S), 62.8% were nurtured exclusively by breastfeeding in their first six months after birth, 42.5% of them visited faith healers before consulting a psychiatrist, 43% had neurodevelopmental disorders, 26.6% had intellectual disabilities with behavioral and emotional comorbidities and 30.4% had other mental/behavioral disorders. Conclusion This study revealed that the child and adolescent psychiatric disorders in Erbil city are versatile and that many factors are significantly associated with them. Cultural concepts are still influential in the region in a way that can interfere with children’s well-being, a situation that calls for more concern and attention.

Characteristics of Patients Attending the Child and Adolescent Psychiatric Outpatient Clinic of a Tertiary Care Hospital in North India

“…Rahi et al 24 found that frequency of psychopathological disorders were highest in children aged 7 to 10 years. The age group with the highest frequency was 6 to 9 years old, according to Abdul qader et al 27 However, after 10 years, a greater risk was discovered in our study. Adolescence is a time of great psychological upheaval during which people are especially prone to emotional and psychological problems.…”

“…36,37 Other diagnoses in our analysis included affective disorders (2%) and autism (0.8%), which were equivalent to 1.4 and 0.94%, respectively, in the study by Chaudhary et al 37 In the current study, the prevalence of OCD was found to be 2.5% which is comparable to other studies. 27 In most cases of intellectual disability, the study group did not receive medication because they were instead psycho-educated on the condition and directed to a clinical psychologist. Antiepileptics were the most often utilized drugs (23%) since the majority of the patients had epilepsy or behavioral issues related to organic brain injury.…”