Psychiatric Morbidity in Children and Adolescent Survivors of a Snowstorm Disaster in South Kashmir, India.

摘要

Objective: To determine the long term psychiatric morbidity in children and adolescents in a snowstorm affected area in South Kashmir, India. Methods: It is a cross sectional study done in a disaster affected population of children and adolescents in South Kashmir 5 years after the disaster. Mini International Neuropsychiatric interview for children and adolescents (MINI-KID) was applied for evaluation of symptoms and diagnosis on a randomly selected group of 100 children and adolescents. A semi-structured proforma was prepared for socio-demographic profile. Kuppuswamy's Socioeconomic Status Scale, 2007 was used for determining socio-economic status. Oslo-3 Social Support Scale (OSS-3) was used to calculate social support. Results : Of the 100 children and adolescents studied (41.32% of the affected population of children and adolescents) 41 were noted to have at least one psychiatric diagnosis (patients). PTSD (14%) was the commonest diagnosis followed by GAD (5%), MDD (4%) and separation anxiety disorder (4%). Psychiatric morbidity was found to be more prevalent in Pre-Adolescents, Females, Primary schoolers, joint families, upper & lower socio economic classes, only-childs and in those with poor social support. Conclusion : Prevalence of psychiatric disorders remain high in children and adolescents long after the disaster has happened.