Greater child pill use hailed

By MARTIN JOHNSTON and NZPA

Child and adolescent psychiatrists have welcomed statistics showing a big increase in young people taking antidepressant drugs.

Dr Sally Merry, of Auckland University, said yesterday that three-quarters of seriously depressed young people received no treatment. More people on medication might indicate a reversal of this trend, through better recognition of mental illness in the young.

She said Government statistics showing that young people's use of antidepressants had increased by almost two-thirds in five years were an improvement, but a big shortfall was still apparent in light of the incidence of major depression.

According to the Health Information Service, the number of antidepressants given to six to 18-year-olds climbed from 14,963 "items dispensed" in 1998 to 24,597 in 2002. An "item" was generally a one-month supply.

Adults' use of the drugs increased by 56 per cent to 1,869,254 items, but use by children under 6 almost halved, to 435.

Antidepressants are used mainly to treat depression, but can be prescribed for a range of other conditions, including anxiety disorders, autism and attention deficit hyperactivity disorder.

Dr Merry said the Prozac group of antidepressants and cognitive behaviour therapy were the most promising treatments for depression.

Specialists say most of the antidepressants taken by 6- to 18-year-olds go to teenagers aged at least 15, which is when there is a sharp increase in the incidence of depression.

But there were no historical statistics, so Dr Merry could not say if depression was becoming more common.

Despite a decline in suicides by 15 to 24-year-olds, New Zealand still has one of the West's highest suicide rates for this age group.

Wellington Hospital's youth mental health service reports a waiting time of four months to receive treatment.

Clinical leader John Zonnevylle said it had too few staff and more teenagers were using the service, mostly because of family breakdowns.

Children as young as 10 were being treated for depression.

Emeritus Professor John Werry, of Auckland University, said other services' waiting times were much less than Wellington's, but in some cases this had been achieved by raising the level of illness at which young people were treated.

Specialist mental health services on average are able to treat only half of the 3 per cent of young people thought to be suffering from severe mental illnesses.

Mental Health Commission member Mary O'Hagan said it was difficult to know whether the increase in children diagnosed with attention deficit disorder and depression reflected a rise in childhood problems, over-zealous diagnosis or a decrease in the social stigma associated with mental illness.

In children under 6, antidepressants were probably used to stop bed-wetting or treat obsessive-compulsive behaviour.

Youthline spokesman Stephen Bell said more young people were getting depressed and younger children seemed to be experiencing psychological problems traditionally associated with 17 to 24-year-olds.

The problem

* About 5 per cent of children and adolescents experienced anxiety disorders.

* The rate of serious depression among 15-year-olds was about 5 per cent, rising to around 17 per cent for those aged 18.

Source: Dr Sally Merry