{"title":"Study of Functional Impairment in Students of Elementary and Secondary Public Schools in Iran.","authors":"Habib Hadianfard, Behnaz Kiani, Margaret D Weiss","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Objective: </strong>The current study aimed to investigate the frequency of impairment in different functional domains of life and the relationship between sex and age and functional impairment in school-based samples of Iranian children and adolescents.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>A sample of 270 children (ages 6-11) enrolled in two public elementary schools and a sample of 386 adolescents (ages 12-17) enrolled in four public secondary schools were selected by multistage sampling. The Persian version of the parent report form and self-report form of the Weiss Functional Impairment Rating Scale (WFIRS-P and WFIRS-S) were used for evaluating functional impairment in children and adolescents, respectively. Two-way analyses of variance (two-way ANOVAs) were conducted to explore the main effects and the interaction effect of sex and age on functional impairment.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>11.9% of children and 29.5% of adolescents showed impairment in at least two functional domains of life. The most frequent impaired domain was life skills (22.6% of children and 30.3% of adolescents). While no significant sex and age effect was found during childhood, male adolescents showed more impairment in externalizing domains and female adolescents showed more internalizing difficulties. In addition, older adolescents showed more functional impairment relative to younger adolescents.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Detailed knowledge of the relationship between sex and age and functional impairment could be a starting point to target the major psychosocial elements of these challenges.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"68-81"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056958/pdf/ccap30_p0068.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38963536","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Jeffrey C L Looi, Stephen Allison, Tarun Bastiampillai, Stephen R Kisely
{"title":"Headspace, an Australian Youth Mental Health Network: Lessons for Canadian Mental Healthcare.","authors":"Jeffrey C L Looi, Stephen Allison, Tarun Bastiampillai, Stephen R Kisely","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Objective: </strong>To describe political advocacy and scientific debate about headspace, a non-governmental organisational (NGO) substantially funded by the Australian federal government that has significantly impacted the youth mental healthcare landscape. Access Open Minds is a Canadian clinical research initiative for youth mental health partially based on headspace. Lessons from the Australian experience may thus prove useful for Canadian stakeholders.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>The Australian healthcare system, mental health policy and governance for youth mental healthcare are contextually described. The structure and promulgation of the headspace NGO is detailed, as a parallel provider of primary mental healthcare outside of existing public and private mental health services. A review of the existing research on the evaluation of headspace was conducted.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>Headspace has expanded rapidly due to successful political advocacy on behalf of the youth early intervention model, with limited coordination in terms of governance, planning and implementation with existing mental health services. In spite of consuming considerable resources, there has been limited evidence of effectiveness.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Canadians should be wary of large youth programs that operate outside mainstream mental healthcare because of similar dangers such as poor co-ordination with existing government-funded services, duplication of care, the substantial consumption of resources, and limited evaluation of outcomes. As Access Open Minds is a clinical research project, there is the opportunity for Canada to evaluate the efficacy of the model before further adoption by governments.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"116-122"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056954/pdf/ccap30_p0116.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954399","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Raymond Khanano, Skye Barbic, Joanna Henderson, Steve Mathias, Christopher G Richardson
{"title":"Reliability and Concurrent Validity of the GAIN Short Screener Among Youth Utilizing Integrated Health Services.","authors":"Raymond Khanano, Skye Barbic, Joanna Henderson, Steve Mathias, Christopher G Richardson","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Objectives: </strong>There is increasing interest in the identification of mental disorders among youth through routine screening in integrated health services. One tool currently being used in Canada is the Global Appraisal of Individual Needs Short Screener (GAIN-SS). The aims of this study were to (1) estimate the internal consistency of the GAIN-SS and its internalizing disorder screener (IDScr) (2) examine concurrent validity of the GAIN-SS and IDScr in an integrated youth health service centre, and (3) identify clinical cut-points for youth aged 17-24 years.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>Participants [n=201, gender=44% women, median age 21 (min,max: 17,24) years] were recruited from an integrated youth health service in Vancouver, British Columbia. Participants completed the GAIN-SS and three reference measures: Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K10), Patient Health Questionnaire (PHQ-9), and Generalized Anxiety Disorder Scale (GAD-7). Cronbach's alpha, sensitivity, and specificity of the GAIN-SS and IDScr were examined using the K-10, PHQ-9 and GAD-7 as reference measures. Receiver operator characteristic curves were generated to identify optimal cut-points for the GAIN-SS and IDScr.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>A cut-point of seven for the GAIN-SS optimized sensitivity (90%) and specificity (42%) with Cronbach's alpha of 0.91. A similar pattern of results was found for the IDScr and the reference measures it was tested against.</p><p><strong>Conclusion: </strong>The results indicate that the GAIN-SS and IDScr have acceptable sensitivity but poor specificity that could be improved via the optimal cut-points identified in this study. This low specificity may be acceptable within an integrated youth health service that provides follow-up diagnostic assessments by a clinician.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"82-91"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056962/pdf/ccap30_p0082.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38963537","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Recommendations for youth engagement in Canadian mental health research in the context of COVID-19.","authors":"Brooke Allemang, Olivia Cullen, Kyleigh Schraeder, Karina Pintson, Gina Dimitropoulos","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>The COVID-19 pandemic has resulted in reduced access to in-person mental health services, and a shift to virtual platforms. Youth may be uniquely impacted by physical distancing requirements during the pandemic, including limited socialization opportunities, closures of educational institutions, a lack of meaningful extracurricular activities and adverse implications on key developmental milestones. Due to the potential impact of COVID-19 on youth well-being, the need to rapidly transform services to be accessible, and the potential risks associated with this rapid transformation, it is imperative that youth continue to be engaged in research and service development. Young people's perspectives, strengths and skills need to be considered to effectively adapt the delivery of mental health services. Continuing to center youth engagement in mental health research throughout the pandemic can ensure research questions, programs, and services align with the needs and preferences of youth. In this commentary, we pose three recommendations for conducting youth-engaged mental health research during the pandemic, including adapting youth engagement strategies when rapid decisions must be made, the use of tools for virtual engagement, and suggestions for evaluating youth engagement practices. These strategies and principles may be applicable to other scenarios where rapid research or system transformation would benefit from youth engagement, such as time-limited child research by trainees (e.g., dissertations) or natural disasters.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"123-130"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056963/pdf/ccap30_p0123.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954400","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"What's race got to do with it? A proposed framework to address racism's impacts on child and adolescent mental health in Canada.","authors":"Amy Gajaria, Jaswant Guzder, Raj Rasasingham","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><p>This commentary responds to current events that have highlighted the ways that systemic racism affects a wide variety of health outcomes. We specifically discuss how systemic racism adversely affects the mental health of children and adolescents in a Canadian context and use a structural framework to demonstrate how race is embedded in various Canadian systems and thus affects child and adolescent mental health in both conscious and unconscious ways throughout the lifespan. Experiences of systemic racism affect the mental health of Canadian young people in multiple complex and intersecting ways including access to care, experience of mental health services, and outcomes of care. We currently lack a national best practice framework for mental health professionals that unifies approaches to research, education, and clinical care for young racialized Canadians; in addition, concerted efforts to collect race-based data are lacking. We suggest that a blueprint for improved services for racialized young people in Canada would include: Development of a funded and sustainable research agenda responsive to community expertise, development and implementation of a Canadian Child and Adolescent task force focused on educational strategies on racism and service provision at both the postgraduate and continuing professional development (CPD) levels, and consideration of clinical parameters that improve access to, and experience of, care for Canadian racialized youth.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"131-137"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056965/pdf/ccap30_p0131.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954401","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Fostering community through advocacy, education and collaboration.","authors":"Jordan Cohen","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"142-143"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056955/pdf/ccap30_p0142.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954404","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Arts & Literature and Nature (ALAN).","authors":"","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"141"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056960/pdf/ccap30_p0141.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954402","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Mark A Ferro, Ellen L Lipman, Ryan J Van Lieshout, Brian Timmons, Lilly Shanahan, Jan Willem Gorter, Kathy Georgiades, Michael Boyle
{"title":"Cohort Profile: Multimorbidity in Children and Youth Across the Life-course (MY LIFE) Study.","authors":"Mark A Ferro, Ellen L Lipman, Ryan J Van Lieshout, Brian Timmons, Lilly Shanahan, Jan Willem Gorter, Kathy Georgiades, Michael Boyle","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"<p><strong>Objective: </strong>This manuscript serves to provide an overview of the methods of the Multimorbidity in Children and Youth across the Life-course (MY LIFE) study, profile sample characteristics of the cohort, and provide baseline estimates of multimorbidity to foster collaboration with clinical and research colleagues across Canada.</p><p><strong>Method: </strong>MY LIFE is comprised of 263 children (2-16 years) with a physical illness recruited from McMaster Children's Hospital, their primary caregiving parent, and their closest-aged sibling. Participants are followed with data collection at recruitment, 6, 12, and 24 months which includes structured interviews, self-reported measures, and biological samples and occur in a private research office or at participants' homes. Post-COVID-19, data collection transitioned to mail and telephone surveys.</p><p><strong>Results: </strong>At recruitment, children were 9.4 (4.2) years of age and 52.7% were male. The mean duration of their physical illness was 4.5 (4.1) years; 25% represent incident cases (duration <1 year). Most (69.7%) had healthy body weight and intelligence in the average range (73.5%). Overall, 38.2% of children screened positive for ≥1 mental illness according to parent report (24.8% screened positive based on child self-report). Compared to 2016 Census data, the MY LIFE cohort overrepresents families of higher socioeconomic status.</p><p><strong>Conclusions: </strong>Multimorbidity is common among children and these baseline data will serve to measure relative changes in the mental health of children with physical illness over time. MY LIFE will provide new information for understanding multimorbidity among children, though underrepresentation of lower socioeconomic families may have implications for the generalizability of findings.</p>","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"104-115"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056956/pdf/ccap30_p0104.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954398","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Early Psychosis.","authors":"","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"138-140"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056964/pdf/ccap30_p0138.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954403","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Promouvoir la communauté par la plaidoirie, l’éducation et la collaboration.","authors":"Dr Jordan Cohen","doi":"","DOIUrl":"","url":null,"abstract":"","PeriodicalId":47053,"journal":{"name":"Journal of the Canadian Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry","volume":"30 2","pages":"144-145"},"PeriodicalIF":2.3,"publicationDate":"2021-05-01","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8056959/pdf/ccap30_p0144.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"38954405","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":0,"RegionCategory":"","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}