Psychiatric morbidity is defined as the presence of handicapping abnormalities of emotions, behavior and relationships that impede personal and social functioning. Accordingly, the present study was designed to argue such issue. A total number of 60 [32 males and 28 females] patients of ages ranging from 5 – 18 from pediatric department of Benha University Hospital and Mansoura University Pediatric Hospital, Egypt, were included in the present study. 40 were patients with chronic (more than one year) diseases as asthma (A) (9 males vs. 11 females), diabetes mellitus (DM) (11 males vs. 9 females) or chronic renal failure (CRF) on regular hemodialysis (12 males vs. 8 females) while the other 20 were clinically healthy ones. Each patient was subjected to full medical history of age, sex, education, socioeconomic state sleep pattern and sleep disorders, history of aggression, history of self-esteem, diagnosis with special emphasis on onset of disease, duration, frequency, complication and treatment. Psychological assessment was performed using Children Anxiety scale (Arabic version) and Children Depression Inventory (Arabic version). A written consent was signed by parents. The majorities of cases came from low socio-economic levels and are still in education. Present results for accompanying psychological morbidities verify low self-esteem in 25% A, 25% DM and 55% CRF; social isolation in 25% A, 30% DM and 20% CRF; sleep disorders in 40% A, 30% DM and 70% CRF; aggression in 10% A, 10% DM and 5% CRF and suicidal thinking in 20% of CRF children. |
