Twelve-month and lifetime prevalences of mental disorders and treatment contact among Pacific people in Te Rau Hinengaro: the New Zealand Mental Health Survey.

OBJECTIVE

To show the 12 month and lifetime prevalences of mental disorders and 12 month treatment contact of Pacific people in Te Rau Hinengaro: The New Zealand Mental Health Survey.

METHOD

Te Rau Hinengaro: The New Zealand Mental Health Survey, undertaken in 2003 and 2004, was a nationally representative face-to-face household survey of 12,992 New Zealand adults aged 16 years and over including Māori (n = 2457), Pacific people (n = 2236), people of mixed Pacific and Māori ethnicity (n = 138), and 'Others' (a composite group of predominantly European descent) (n = 8161). Ethnicity was measured by self-identified ethnicity using the New Zealand 2001 Census of Population and Dwellings question. A fully structured diagnostic interview, the World Health Organization World Mental Health Survey Initiative version of the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI 3.0), was used to measure disorders. The overall response rate was 73.3%.

RESULTS

Pacific people have high rates of mental illness: the unadjusted 12 month prevalence for Pacific people was 25.0% compared with 20.7% for the total New Zealand population. There were also higher 12 month prevalences of suicidal ideation (4.5%) and suicide attempts (1.2%). Only 25.0% of Pacific people who had experienced a serious mental disorder had visited any health service for their mental health reason compared with 58.0% of the total New Zealand population. The prevalence of mental disorder was lower among Pacific people born in the Islands than among New Zealand-born Pacific people.

CONCLUSION

Pacific people experience high prevalence of mental disorder and New Zealand-born Pacific people experience significantly higher prevalence than Island-born Pacific people.