Online Program

292791
Exploring mental health treatment disparities among youths aged 12 to 17 who experienced major depressive episode with severe impairment in past year in the United States


Monday, November 4, 2013

Jamie Gwinn, MA, School of Community Health and Policy, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD
Mian B. Hossain, PhD, School of Community Health and Policy, Morgan State University, Baltimore, MD
Background: The percentage of youths aged 12-17 who had past year major depressive episode (MDE) has increased from 8.0% in 2010 to 8.2% in 2011. Among youths aged 12-17 in 2011, females were more likely than males to have past year MDE with severe impairment (8.3 vs. 3.2 percent). Among youths in 2011 with past year MDE, 19.9% saw or talked to a health professional only, 2.6% used prescription medication only, and 13.6% received treatment from both sources for depression in the past year. In 2011, 43.5% of youths with past year MDE with severe impairment received treatment for depression. Among youths, past year mental health service utilization was 8.8% for blacks and 16.2% for whites. Objective: The primary objective of this research is to assess the factors associated with mental health treatment disparities among youths aged 12-17. Data and methods: The data for this research are taken from 2011 National Survey on Drug Use and Health (NSDUH) for youth age 12-17. Several weighted logistic regression models were estimated to assess factors associated with receiving of mental health treatment among youths, who had MDE in past year with severe impairment. Results and Conclusion: Weighted logistic regression results suggest that among youths, blacks are about 0.40% [OR: 0.61; 95% CI: 0.58-0.78] significantly (p<0.001) less likely to receive mental health treatment compared to whites after controlling for the effect of socio-economic and demographic factors. Untreated mental illness disrupts our daily lives and allows youths to be involved in fighting and killing innocents.

Learning Areas:

Administer health education strategies, interventions and programs
Epidemiology
Provision of health care to the public
Public health or related public policy
Public health or related research

Learning Objectives:
Describe the levels of MDE with severe impairment among youths Formulate how treat MDE with severe impairment patient Analyze NSDUH data Differentiate the treatment disparities of MDE with severe impairment patients

Keyword(s): Mental Health, Treatment

Presenting author's disclosure statement:

Qualified on the content I am responsible for because: I am a doctoral student studying Doctor in Public Health. Currently I am working on developing my doctoral dissertation proposal on the issues of mental treatment. I am also trained in Public Health with an emphasis on mental health. I am working in the areas of mental health.
Any relevant financial relationships? No

I agree to comply with the American Public Health Association Conflict of Interest and Commercial Support Guidelines, and to disclose to the participants any off-label or experimental uses of a commercial product or service discussed in my presentation.