1. Prevalence and co-morbidity among anxiety disorders in a national cohort of psychiatrically referred children and adolescents
- Author
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Esbjørn, Barbara Hoff, Hoeyer, Mette, Dyrborg, Jørgen, Leth, Ingrid, and Kendall, Philip C.
- Subjects
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COMORBIDITY , *ANXIETY disorders , *ANXIETY in children , *ANXIETY in adolescence , *DISEASE prevalence , *MEDICAL referrals , *MEDICAL statistics - Abstract
Abstract: The paper provides prevalence estimates of anxiety disorders as well as homotypic (e.g., other anxiety disorders) and heterotypic (e.g., mood, externalizing) co-morbidity in a national sample of children and adolescents referred to the psychiatric system in Denmark. Data were gathered from a database containing 83% of all youth referred from 2004 to 2007 (N =13,241). A prevalence of 5.7% of anxiety disorder was found in the sample. Homotypic co-morbidity was found in only 2.8%, whereas heterotypic co-morbidity was found in 42.9% of the cohort. A total of 73.6% had a principal anxiety disorder as opposed to 26.4% who had other principal diagnoses and a secondary anxiety disorder. The national database not only provides a valuable prevalence estimate of anxiety disorders in every-day non-research psychiatric settings, but also highlights the importance of applying standardized screening instruments as routine to increase the precision in recognizing and reporting on childhood anxiety disorders. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]
- Published
- 2010
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