In US, mental sickness in young becomes a scourge

In 2019, 1 in every 5 hospitalizations for children aged 3-17 in the United States was due to a mental health issue, and hospitalizations for pediatric mental health conditions have grown by more than 25 percent between 2009 and 2019, according to a recent study.

The study, recently published in medical journal Jama and conducted by medical researchers at Dartmouth College in New Hampshire state, analyzed more than 4.7 million pediatric hospitalizations. It found that annual hospitalizations for mental health diagnoses increased from 160,499 in 2009 to 201,932 in 2019.

Of these, hospitalizations with a diagnosis of attempted suicide or self-injury increased from 49,285 in 2009 to 129,699 in 2019 and comprised 64 percent of mental health hospitalizations in 2019. That is an increase from 30 percent in 2009.

The study reported that 1 in every 6 youths in the US has a mental health condition, and suicide is the leading cause of death for that segment of the population. However, less than half of them reported receiving any mental health services in the previous year prior to hospitalization.

Depression-related disorders were the most common primary diagnoses among the children and comprised almost 30 percent of all mental health hospitalizations in 2009; the rate increased significantly to almost 57 percent in 2019.

Female youth are at higher risk for mental problems. Of about 210,000 pediatric mental health hospitalizations in 2019, more than 123,000 were females, accounting for 61 percent of the total. However, a decade ago, in 2009, female youth mental health hospitalizations were only slightly over half at 51.8 percent.

Hospitalizations for eating and feeding disorders also increased significantly — almost doubling between 2009 and 2019.

Even though the pediatric mental health problems were prevalent, more than one-third of US counties don't have an outpatient mental health facility that provides treatment for children, the study found.

Gabrielle Carlson, director of child and adolescent psychiatry at Stony Brook University School of Medicine, told The New York Times that the study underlines gaping inadequacies in the health system.

"You have got a whole system failure here that is registering itself in suicidal kids," Carlson told the Times. She said that parents seeking care for children encounter a series of frustrations: clinicians who don't take insurance or aren't taking new patients; crisis interventions staffed by low-paid, poorly trained workers; insurers that don't reimburse well.

"The hospital ends up being the place you go when all else fails," Carlson said.