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Symptoms of anxiety and depression have important consequences for patients with chronic disease, including lower rates of adherence and increased morbidity. This review discusses the prevalence of anxiety and depression in patients with cystic fibrosis (CF) across the life span and highlights current understanding of how these symptoms affect adherence, health outcomes, and health-related quality of life (HRQOL). Anxiety and depression appear to be more common in patients with CF than in the general population. Recent studies also indicate that symptoms of anxiety occur more frequently than depression in this population. Both anxiety and depression have been shown to be associated with poorer disease outcomes, including HRQOL. Depression, specifically, leads to lower adherence to recommended therapies. Given the prevalence and impact of anxiety and depression in CF, it seems appropriate to recommend annual screening using a validated approach, with referral for either pharmacotherapy or cognitive behavioral therapy of those with apparent symptoms. A large-scale epidemiological study of anxiety and depression in CF is under way and should provide better prevalence estimates and more information on the effects of these psychological symptoms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aims of this study were to examine the development of visual attention in deaf and hearing infants and toddlers, and assess whether improvements in visual attention were observed in the deaf sample after 12 months of cochlear implantation. A novel puppet task, based on a measure of attention developed with normally hearing infants, was administered to 88 deaf and 42 normal-hearing children at three time points: baseline, six and 12 months post-implantation for the deaf sample. At baseline, deaf children demonstrated significantly more inattentive looks during the puppet skits than hearing children, and these looks were of longer duration, confirming the results of prior studies which have documented deficits in visual attention in deaf children. Longitudinal analyses showed significant decreases in the frequency of inattentive looks for both groups, with a significant decrease in the duration of inattentive looks only for the cochlear implant group. The largest decrease in duration of off-task looks occurred at six months post-implantation, indicating that improvements occurred rapidly after restoration of auditory input. These results provided support for the 'division of labor' hypothesis which suggests that deaf children with no access or limited access to sound must monitor their environment visually, making it difficult for them to focus and attend to specific tasks. Cochlear implantation appeared to alter the developmental trajectory of visual attention in a positive manner. The clinical implications of visual attention for the development of early language, reading and social skills are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article presents a study which examined the association between psychosocial factors such as peer victimization, child depressive symptoms, parent distress and health-related quality of life (QOL) in overweight youth. To assess the effect of child depressive symptoms on the relationship between these psychosocial variables and QOL, mediator models were used. It has been found that increased parent distress, peer victimization and child depressive symptoms were associated with lower QOL.