Mental Illness Affects Half Of All Americans During Their Lifetime
http://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/233884.php
Medical News Today
05 Sep 2011
Approximately half of all American adults with suffer some kind of mental illness during their lifetime, a CDC reports announced. The authors stress the need for better surveillance in order to improve treatment and prevention.
Ileana Arias, Ph.D., principle deputy director of CDC, said:
"We know that mental illness is an important public health problem in itself and is also associated with chronic medical diseases such as cardiovascular disease, diabetes, obesity, and cancer. The report's findings indicate that we need to expand surveillance activities that monitor levels of mental illness in the United States in order to strengthen our prevention efforts."
According to a SAMHSA (Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration) study carried out in 2009, 4.8% of America's adult population - 11 million people - had suffered a mental illness during the preceding twelve months. They define a mental illness as "a diagnosable mental disorder (that) has substantially interfered with, or limited one or more major life activities."
This study reports that over the previous twelve months, about 8.4 million American adults thought seriously about suicide, 2.2 made plans to end their lives, and about one million attempted to commit suicide.
SAMHSA administrator Pamela S. Hyde, said:
"This new CDC study combined with SAMHSA's latest surveillance data provides a powerful picture of the impact of mental illness on public health. People with mental disorders should seek help with the same urgency as any other health condition.
Treatment and support services are effective and people do recover."
Depression prevalence in the USA
The table below is from the 2006 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, which shows depression rates across the USA among adults aged 18+ years. Depression rates are higher in the southeastern states (data on Ohio, New York, Massachusetts, Illinois, Idaho, Colorado and Arizona refer to 2008):
Depression rates in the USA
Serious psychological distress prevalence in the USA
The table below is from the 2007 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System. Serious psychological distress rates were generally higher in the southeastern states. The researchers defined serious psychological distress as a Kessler-6 score of thirteen or more:
Showing posts with label mental illness. Show all posts
Showing posts with label mental illness. Show all posts
Monday, September 5, 2011
Nearly 40 percent of Europeans suffer mental illness
Nearly 40 percent of Europeans suffer mental illness
By Kate Kelland
Sep 4, 2011
(Reuters) Europeans are plagued by mental and neurological illnesses, with almost 165 million people or 38 percent of the population suffering each year from a brain disorder such as depression, anxiety, insomnia or dementia, according to a large new study.
With only about a third of cases receiving the therapy or medication needed, mental illnesses cause a huge economic and social burden -- measured in the hundreds of billions of euros -- as sufferers become too unwell to work and personal relationships break down.
"Mental disorders have become Europe's largest health challenge of the 21st century," the study's authors said.
At the same time, some big drug companies are backing away from investment in research on how the brain works and affects behavior, putting the onus on governments and health charities to stump up funding for neuroscience.
"The immense treatment gap ... for mental disorders has to be closed," said Hans Ulrich Wittchen, director of the institute of clinical psychology and psychotherapy at Germany's Dresden University and the lead investigator on the European study.
"Those few receiving treatment do so with considerable delays of an average of several years and rarely with the appropriate, state-of-the-art therapies."
Wittchen led a three-year study covering 30 European countries -- the 27 European Union member states plus Switzerland, Iceland and Norway -- and a population of 514 million people.
A direct comparison of the prevalence of mental illnesses in other parts of the world was not available because different studies adopt varying parameters.
Wittchen's team looked at about 100 illnesses covering all major brain disorders from anxiety and depression to addiction to schizophrenia, as well as major neurological disorders including epilepsy, Parkinson's and multiple sclerosis.
The results, published by the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ENCP) on Monday, show an "exceedingly high burden" of mental health disorders and brain illnesses, he told reporters at a briefing in London.
Mental illnesses are a major cause of death, disability, and economic burden worldwide and the World Health Organization predicts that by 2020, depression will be the second leading contributor to the global burden of disease across all ages.
Wittchen said that in Europe, that grim future had arrived early, with diseases of the brain already the single largest contributor to the EU's burden of ill health.
The four most disabling conditions -- measured in terms of disability-adjusted life years or DALYs, a standard measure used to compare the impact of various diseases -- are depression, dementias such as Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia, alcohol dependence and stroke.
The last major European study of brain disorders, which was published in 2005 and covered a smaller population of about 301 million people, found 27 percent of the EU adult population was suffering from mental illnesses...
By Kate Kelland
Sep 4, 2011
(Reuters) Europeans are plagued by mental and neurological illnesses, with almost 165 million people or 38 percent of the population suffering each year from a brain disorder such as depression, anxiety, insomnia or dementia, according to a large new study.
With only about a third of cases receiving the therapy or medication needed, mental illnesses cause a huge economic and social burden -- measured in the hundreds of billions of euros -- as sufferers become too unwell to work and personal relationships break down.
"Mental disorders have become Europe's largest health challenge of the 21st century," the study's authors said.
At the same time, some big drug companies are backing away from investment in research on how the brain works and affects behavior, putting the onus on governments and health charities to stump up funding for neuroscience.
"The immense treatment gap ... for mental disorders has to be closed," said Hans Ulrich Wittchen, director of the institute of clinical psychology and psychotherapy at Germany's Dresden University and the lead investigator on the European study.
"Those few receiving treatment do so with considerable delays of an average of several years and rarely with the appropriate, state-of-the-art therapies."
Wittchen led a three-year study covering 30 European countries -- the 27 European Union member states plus Switzerland, Iceland and Norway -- and a population of 514 million people.
A direct comparison of the prevalence of mental illnesses in other parts of the world was not available because different studies adopt varying parameters.
Wittchen's team looked at about 100 illnesses covering all major brain disorders from anxiety and depression to addiction to schizophrenia, as well as major neurological disorders including epilepsy, Parkinson's and multiple sclerosis.
The results, published by the European College of Neuropsychopharmacology (ENCP) on Monday, show an "exceedingly high burden" of mental health disorders and brain illnesses, he told reporters at a briefing in London.
Mental illnesses are a major cause of death, disability, and economic burden worldwide and the World Health Organization predicts that by 2020, depression will be the second leading contributor to the global burden of disease across all ages.
Wittchen said that in Europe, that grim future had arrived early, with diseases of the brain already the single largest contributor to the EU's burden of ill health.
The four most disabling conditions -- measured in terms of disability-adjusted life years or DALYs, a standard measure used to compare the impact of various diseases -- are depression, dementias such as Alzheimer's disease and vascular dementia, alcohol dependence and stroke.
The last major European study of brain disorders, which was published in 2005 and covered a smaller population of about 301 million people, found 27 percent of the EU adult population was suffering from mental illnesses...
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