Children With Anxiety Disorders Face Higher Risk for Self-Harm, ER Visits, Hospitalization

Children with newly diagnosed anxiety disorders were significantly more likely to experience serious medical events requiring treatment in the emergency room (ER) or inpatient hospitalization than children who did not have these disorders, according to astudy published inDepression and Anxiety.“Within two years following a new anxiety disorder diagnosis, a significant proportion of children have a mental health–related hospitalization, inpatient treated self-harm event, or ER visit, which translates to a sizable number of children, given the prevalence of anxiety disorders,” wrote a uthor Greta A. Bushnell, Ph.D., a postdoctoral fellow in the Department of Epidemiology at Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, and colleagues. Some 54 million children worldwide are estimated to have an anxiety disorder, according to the Global Burden of Disease Pediatrics Collabora tion.For the study, Bushnell and colleagues identified nearly 200,000 commercially insured children (aged 3 to 17) who were newly diagnosed with anxiety disorder in an office setting and had not received treatment for anxiety. The authors then examined the incidence of mental health –related hospitalization, inpatient treatment for suicide and self-inflicted injury, suicidal ideation, and ER visits in these children over a two-year period. They also examined the incidence of these events in children without an anxiety diagnosis (matched by age, sex, geographical region).Within two years of diag...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: anxiety children Depression & emergency room Greta Bushnell hospitalization self-harm suicidal ideation Source Type: research