ArticleJournal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines2025
Socio-demographic variation in diagnosis of and prescribing for common mental illnesses among children and young people during the COVID-19 pandemic: time series analysis of primary care electronic health records.
Article in Journal of child psychology and psychiatry, and allied disciplines, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
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Who cites it
4 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it.
- Ethnic and socioeconomic inequalities in the mental health of children and young people with pre-existing mental health and neurodevelopmental conditions during the COVID-19 pandemic: a systematic review of longitudinal studies.European child & adolescent psychiatry · 2026Pooled it
- Article
- Temporal trends in primary care-recorded psychiatric diagnoses and psychotropic medication prescribing among children and young people in the UK: a population-based study.The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners · 2025Article
- Is forest bathing a panacea for mental health problems? A narrative review.Frontiers in public health · 2025Review
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10 authors.
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Abstract
backgroundThe impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the mental health of children and young people (CYP) has been widely reported. Primary care electronic health records were utilised to examine trends in the diagnosing, recording and treating of these common mental disorders by ethnicity and social deprivation in Greater Manchester, England.
methodsTime-series analyses conducted using Greater Manchester Care Record (GMCR) data examined all diagnosed episodes of anxiety disorders and depression and prescribing of anxiolytics and antidepressants among patients aged 6-24 years. The 41-month observation period was split into three epochs: Pre-pandemic (1/2019-2/2020); Pandemic Phase 1 (3/2020-6/2021); Pandemic Phase 2 (7/2021-5/2022). Rate ratios for all CYP specific to sex, age, ethnicity, and neighbourhood-level Indices of Multiple Deprivation (IMD) quintile were modelled using negative binomial regression.
resultsDepression and anxiety disorder rates were highest in females, CYP aged 19-24, and White and 'Other' ethnic groups. During Pandemic Phase 1, rates for these diagnoses fell in all demographic subgroups and then rose to similar levels as those recorded pre-pandemic. In Pandemic Phase 2, rates in Black and Mixed-ethnicity females rose to a significantly greater degree (by 54% and 62%, respectively) than those in White females. Prescribing rates increased throughout the study period, with significantly greater rises observed in non-White females and males. The temporal trends were mostly homogeneous across deprivation quintiles.
conclusionThe observed fluctuations in frequency of recorded common mental illness diagnoses likely reflect service accessibility and patients' differential propensities to consult as well as changing levels of distress and psychopathology in the population. However, psychotropic medication prescribing increased throughout the observation period, possibly indicating a sustained decline in mental health among CYP, and also clinicians' responses to problems presented. The comparatively greater increases in frequencies of diagnosis recording and medication prescribing among ethnic minority groups warrants further investigation.
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