Abstract
Back ground: Asthma is the most common chronic disease in children. Thus determination and treatment of co morbid factors such as depression in these patients could be valuable . The aim of this study was to investigate the association between asthma and depression among 13 to 15- year-old adolescents.
Method :This cross sectional study were carried out among 1500 students who randomly selected from 20 schools of Zanjan city. Asthma were detected on the basis of ISAAC questionnaire . The similar number of students who didn't have atopy or asthma were selected as control group. Depression was assessed by Beck questionnaire in both groups. Data was analyzed by SPSS software
Results: Two hundred and twenty five students (15%) had asthma and among them
20%, 23.6% and 18.2% had severe, moderate and mild depression, respectively.
Meanwhile in non asthmatic group 7.5%m 14.5% and 14.5% students had mild, Moderate and
severe depression; respectively. The students with asthma were significantly 2.87 (95%CI:1.96-4.26, p=0.0001) times more likely to have depression. There was also a significant correlation between severity of asthma and depression(P=0.0001).
Conclusion: The prevalence of depression among children with asthma is higher. Thus attention to psychosocial factors in these patients and psychiatric intervention could beneficently improve asthma symptoms.
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