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Aim and Objectives: Although inclusive education of children with intellectual disability is currently an accepted practice, it is often challenged by negative attitude of schoolteachers. We undertook two surveillance studies aimed at Study A - identifying knowledge and teachers' attitudes towards children with intellectual disability and practices of inclusive education in a semi-urban school of South India. Study B -Determining the effect of educational intervention towards attitudes on inclusive education. Method: Knowledge, Attitude and Practice surveillance questionnaires (KAP and ATPD) were given to ninety-six consenting schoolteachers in Study A and twenty schoolteachers in Study B and analyzed. Results: In Study A, the overall attitude mean indicated a favorable attitude towards the children with intellectual disability. The mean overall attitude score was 77.1 (SD: 9.58), with a normal distribution. Forty to fifty percent were aware of intellectual disability and attributed them to biological causes. Ninety-two percent agreed on the need for education and stepwise training for a child with an intellectual disability. In real-life practice, results of classroom management were inaccurate. In Study B, knowledge, attitudes and practices towards inclusive education improved with educational intervention with a positive change of 7.19% on the ATDP scale. Conclusion: These findings suggest a generally positive attitude towards intellectual disability and inclusive education. Comprehensive training programs improve knowledge and attitudes towards inclusive education.

Abstract Background There is increasing interest in identifying adolescents with depression in primary care settings by paediatricians in India. This article studied the diagnostic accuracy, reliability and validity of Beck Depression Inventory (BDI) while used by paediatricians in a primary care setting in India. Methods 181 adolescents attending 3 schools were administered a back translated Tamil version of BDI by a paediatrician to evaluate its psychometric properties along with Children's Depression Rating Scale (CDRS-R) for convergent validity. Clinical diagnosis of depressive disorders, for reference standard, was based on ICD-10 interview by an independent psychiatrist who also administered the Impact of Event Scale (IES) for divergent validity. Appropriate analyses for validity and diagnostic accuracy both at the item and scale levels were conducted. Results A cut-off score of ≥ 5 (Sn = 90.9%, Sp = 17.6 %) for screening and cut-off score of ≥ 22 (Sn = 27.3%, Sp = 90%) for diagnostic utility is suggested. The 4 week test – retest reliability was good (r = 0.82). In addition to the adequate face and content validity, BDI has very good internal consistency (α = 0.96), high convergent validity with CDRS-R (r = 0.72; P = 0.001), and high discriminant validity with IES (r = 0.26; P = 0.23). There was a moderate concordance rate with the reference standard (54.5%) in identifying depression among the adolescents. Factor analysis replicated the 2-factor structure explaining 30.5 % of variance. Conclusion The BDI proved to be a psychometrically sound measure for use by paediatricians in a primary care setting in India. The possibility of screening for depressive disorders through the use of BDI may be helpful in identifying probable cases of the disorder among adolescents.

Byline: Mona. Basker, Paul. Russell, Sushila. Russell, Prabhakar. Moses Background: Adolescent depression needs to be identified and treated in the primary care settings. There is no clinician-rated measure validated in [...]

A trial was designed to evaluate the role of enhanced parental attitude towards management of intellectual disability in the acquisition of adaptive behaviour. Fifty-seven children with intellectual disability and their parents were randomly assigned to 12 weeks of either multimodal adaptive behaviour training plus interactive group psycho-education (intervention group); or multimodal adaptive behaviour training plus didactic lectures (control group). Blinded raters were involved. Completers’ and intention-to-treat analyses were conducted. In the intention-to-treat sample, 22 of 29 children in the intervention group compared with four of 28 children in the control group showed a significant improvement in the acquisition of adaptive behaviour. The minimum additive efficacy provided by the enhanced parental attitude was 80 percent. Meaningful clinical benefits on various measures were found for the intervention group after training. Parental attitude intervention should be included in adaptive behaviour training for children with intellectual disability, as enhanced parental attitude has short-term positive effects. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Objective: To develop and validate a concise, parent-completed Brief Intellectual Disability Scale (BIDS) for children in low--disability resource and high--disability care burden countries. Study Design and Setting: In this prospective cross-sectional study of 124 children recruited from a facility for intellectual disability (ID), the newly developed BIDS as the measure for validation as well as for the gold standard and convergent and divergent validities was administered by independent raters. Tests for diagnostic accuracy, reproducibility, and validity were conducted at the item and scale levels. Results: The BIDS scores of ≥5 (sensitivity [Sn]71.43%, specificity [Sp]580.95%) and ≥11 (Sn=4.29%, Sp=100%), with area under the curve of 0.79, are suggested, respectively, for screening and diagnostic use in Indian populations. The inter-rater reliability (intraclass correlation coefficient [ICC]=0.96) and test--retest reliability at 4 weeks (ICC=0.95) for BIDS are strong. Besides the adequate face and content validities, BIDS demonstrates good internal consistency (Cronbach a50.80) and item-total correlation. There is moderate convergent validity with BineteKamat Test of Intelligence or Gesell's Developmental Schedule (r50.66, P50.001) as well as with adaptive behavior measure of Vineland Social Maturity Scale (r5 0.52, P50.001) and low divergent validity with the subscales of Attention Deficit Disorder with Hyperactivity: Comprehensive Teacher Rating Scale (r50.11, P50.7; r50.18, P50.5; r50.13, P50.6; r50.08, P50.7). An exploratory factor analysis demonstrated a three-factor structure, explaining 60% of variance. Conclusion: The BIDS shows promise as a psychometrically adequate, yet brief measure for identifying ID in countries with low disability care resources and high disability-related burden. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this session is to assess the anthropometric status of children with ASD in India. Higher education in parents had positive correlation with height for age z-score (p < 0.001). Vineland Social Maturity Scale (VSMS) scores showed positive correlation for weight for age z-score (p = 0.018) and for height for age z-score (p = 0.006). [Extracted from the article]

The Asian earthquake and subsequent tsunami of December 2004, one of the largest natural disasters in recent history, resulted in the deaths of over 250,000 people and massive destruction in 8 countries. As with any disaster, children are at risk for developing short- and long-term psychological consequences, including posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). One area particularly affected by this disaster was southern India. Five hundred twenty-three juvenile survivors of the tsunami were studied to determine the prevalence of PTSD. The survey was conducted in 2 waves. Interviews were conducted by postgraduate psychiatric social work students, proficient in the local language of Tamil and trained in PTSD-related data collection. The Impact of Event Scale-8 items Tamil Version and Child Behaviour Checklist Post-traumatic Stress Disorder-Tamil Revised Version, with age-specific measures and validated for the local culture and language, were used for the study. Our study revealed a prevalence of 70.7% for acute PTSD and 10.9% for delayed onset PTSD. PTSD was more prevalent among girls and more severe among adolescents exposed to loss of life or property. These results indicate that PTSD is widely prevalent among the survivors of the tsunami, reinforcing the need to develop an effective, culturally sensitive outreach therapy strategy for them.