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A new study, published in the journal BMC Psychiatry, showed that many children and young people with obsessive thoughts and compulsions experienced their obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), anxiety, and depressive symptoms worsened during COVID-19.
OCD is a mental illness that causes repeated unwanted thoughts or feelings (obsessions) or the urge to do something over and over again (compulsions). Some people may have both obsessions and compulsions.
The study also said that Covid-19 may be associated with adults who develop psychiatric disorders.
COVID-19 pandemic and DOC
Speaking about the study, lead author Judith Nissen of Aarhus University in Denmark said the disorder is particularly interesting to study in relation to the COVID-19 pandemic because OCD is a disorder with many different clinical expressions.
He added that it is therefore important to examine how such a significant seizure can affect the expression, frequency and progression of the disorder.
For the results, the researchers sent a questionnaire to two groups of children and young people between the ages of seven and 21.
One group had been diagnosed with OCD in a specialized OCD section at the Center for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry – and all had been in contact with a hospital therapist. The other group was identified through the Danish OCD Association.
Most of these children and young people had been diagnosed years ago. A total of 102 children answered the questionnaire.
Symptoms of OCD worsened during a pandemic
“Their experience was that their OCD, anxiety, and depressive symptoms worsened during a crisis such as COVID-19. This worsening was most pronounced for the group identified through the OCD Association,” the authors wrote.
Almost half of the children and young people who belonged to the first group reported that their symptoms had worsened, while a third of them responded that their anxiety had worsened and a third that their depressive symptoms had worsened.
And of those, nearly a fifth experienced both symptoms worsening.
In the other group, 73% reported that their condition had worsened, just over half that their anxiety had worsened, and 43% reported that their depressive symptoms had increased.
Notably, children who started suffering from OCD at an early age experienced the most pronounced worsening, the study noted.
Active COVID-19 cases in India dropped below 5 lakhs for the first time
The COVID-19 workload in India surpassed 86 lakhs on Wednesday, while the number of people recovering from the disease rose to 80.13 lakh, pushing the national recovery rate to 92.79%.
Published: 12 November 2020, 08:30 | Updated: November 12, 2020 8:31 am
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