@article{ref1,
title="Somatic symptoms as a marker for severity in adolescent depression",
journal="Acta paediatrica",
year="2010",
author="Bohman, Hannes and Jonsson, Ulf and von Knorring, Anne-Liis and von Knorring, Lars and Päären, Aivar and Olsson, Gunilla",
volume="99",
number="11",
pages="1724-1730",
abstract="AIM: This study aims to investigate the prevalence of somatic symptoms in depressed adolescents and in their healthy peers. A second aim is to investigate the correlation, in the depressed adolescents, between the number of somatic symptoms and severe concurrent symptoms, signs and life events. METHODS: The total population of 16-17 year olds - in the city of Uppsala - was screened for depression and then interviewed using a structured interview questionnaire. Depressed subjects and matched controls were identified. A total of 177 pairs were used for pair-wise analyses of somatic symptoms. Severe symptoms, signs and life events were selected for analysing their relation to depression with somatic symptoms. RESULTS: The adolescents with depressive disorders experienced considerably more somatic symptoms than their healthy controls. The duration and depth of the depression correlated with the number of somatic symptoms. There was a strong correlation between depression with many somatic symptoms and suicidal plans/thoughts, suicidal attempts, disruptive behaviour, as well as multiple stressful relationships. CONCLUSION: This study demonstrates that somatic symptoms are common in adolescent depression. Multiple somatic symptoms within depression imply a higher severity in terms of duration, depth and psychiatric comorbidity. The strong correlation with suicidal plans, suicidal attempts and disruptive behaviour is concerning.<p /><p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="0803-5253",
doi="10.1111/j.1651-2227.2010.01906.x",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/j.1651-2227.2010.01906.x"
}