Depression and anxiety levels of children and adolescents with attention deficit and hyperactivity disorder

Objective: The aim of this study is to compare the depression and anxiety levels of children with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with healthy controls.

Method: 47 children and adolescents with ADHD, aged between 7-12, who were evaluated according to DSM-IV criteria and 44 healthy children and adolescents, who matched to patients in terms of age and education levels were included in this study. Sociodemographic data form, parent-report of Children’s Depression Inventory (PR-CDI), child-report Children’s Depression Inventory (CR-CDI), Spence Children’s Anxiety Scale (SCAS) were applied to the participants.

Results: It was revealed that depression and anxiety levels of children with ADHD were significantly higher than healthy controls. Both CDI Parents and CDI Self Depressive symptom levels were positively correlated with age and anxiety symptom levels. The panic/agoraphobia, separation anxiety, social phobia, generalized anxiety subscales’ scores of SCAS in ADHD were significantly higher than healthy controls (p<0.05).

Conclusions: The comorbidity of depression and anxiety disorders was found to be frequent in ADHD samples. Clinicians should be careful about comorbid depression and anxiety disorder when they treat children and adolescents with ADHD.