Poor mental health in children and young people has been described as an epidemic and an “escalating crisis”. The number of children seeking help from Camhs (Child and Adolescent Mental Health Services) in England has more than doubled in the past two years.
It is difficult to establish how much of this represents young people experiencing problems and how much is down to better awareness of symptoms and diagnosis.
An NHS survey of young people in England showed a small rise in diagnosable emotional disorders like depression and anxiety especially in young girls. One in eight 5 to 19-year-olds had at least one mental disorder when assessed in 2017. The researchers found the proportion of under-16s experiencing any type of mental disorder had risen from 11.4% to 13.6% between 1999 and 2017. These disorders include anxiety and depression as well as behavioural and hyperactivity. Older teenagers were included in the survey and it suggested that women aged 17-19 were two thirds more likely than younger girls to experience poor mental health.
In secondary school one in seven 11 to 16-year-olds were identified with a mental disorder, 6.2% in 2017 were identified to meet two or more mental disorders. Emotional disorders are the most common for this age and was followed by behavioural disorders.
In England there has been a rise in admissions for self harm, in 2016-17 there were 13,463 females and 2,332 males who were admitted to hospital for self harm. The total for 2007-08 to 2016-17 were 115,596 females, 21,721 males and 10 unknown admitted for self harm. The unknown gender is down to the hospital not or the patient has withheld the information from being submitted. A better understanding by professionals has led to more cases being reported as self-harm. This has also be down to the reduction in stigma. Many people do self-harm severely but never go to hospital.
Here are the types of mental disorders that are most commonly found in young people and adolescence:
Emotional disorders
Emotional disorders include anxiety, depression, bipolar and mania. Anxiety is when you feel restless, sense of dread, feeling ‘on edge’, difficulty concentrating and irritability; many people will only have one or two symptoms of anxiety. Anxiety creates a change in your behaviour and how you think and feel about things. You many feel like you need to withdraw from social contact to avoid worry or dread. It can make the day to day tasks difficult and stressful. Physical symptoms of anxiety are: dizziness, tiredness, fast heartbeat, shaking, muscle aches, dry mouth, sweating, shortness of breath, stomach ache, feeling sick, headache, pins and needles, difficulty with sleeping. Depression is characterised by sadness, loss of interest and energy it is also low self esteem. Many people go through phases of being down but when you are depressed it can be weeks or months. Depression can affect social aspects, physical wellbeing and mental wellbeing. Bipolar is when someone’s mood swings high and low, it can last for weeks and months. One minute someone can seem fine and very happy the next they will feel low and sad. Bipolar goes from extreme mania to extreme depression. Mania are phases of overactive and excited behaviour that impacts day to day life. Mania lasts for a week and it can be serious enough to have to have hospital treatment. People experiencing mania will have uncontrollable excitement, believe they have invincible or have special powers, paranoia, hear voices, loss of insight, become aggressive, forgetting to eat, drink and look after themselves.
Behavioural disorders
These disorders are characterised by repetitive and persistent patterns of disruptive and violent behaviour. This can be attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), ODD, CD. ADHD affects people by having a difficulty concentrating, forgetting instructions, talking over others, accident-prone, constant restlessness and fidgeting. ODD affects someone by making them get annoyed easily, anger, argues more, refusing to follow rules, annoy others, low self-esteem and seeks to blame others. CD is someone who does not want to follow rules and refuses to act how they are told to. People with CD will disobey rules, fall into illegal substances, have the urgency to have physical fights, runway from home, abuse, lack of emotion and always lie.
Hyperactivity disorders
Hyperactivity is the constant way of being distracted, impulsive, lack of concentration and aggressiveness. They will have a very short attention span and will not be able to sit still. This will make them seem like they are misbehaving and troubled to many.
Other less common disorders for children and adolescences are ASD, eating disorders and tic disorders.
