Childhood abuse and anxiety, depression - An interprofessional approach to optimize knowledge and awareness among young adult health professions students of Arunachal Pradesh, India.

BACKGROUND

Child abuse is a major public health concern with deep rooted squeal events on adult mental health. The childhood negligence and abusive events is connected invariably with anxiety and depressive disorders in adult life.

OBJECTIVES

The study focused to determine the prevalence of child abuse, and connection of child abuse with depression and anxiety in course of adulthood, and to evaluate the effect of Interprofessional approach on the knowledge and awareness on child abuse and legal polices among young adult students of health professions in Arunachal Pradesh, India.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

Four hundred sixty-one young adult health professions students from Tomo Riba Institute of Health and Medical Sciences (TRIHMS) and related health sciences institutes in the Itanagar capital complex region of Arunachal Pradesh between age group of 18-25 years.

METHODS

A semi structured self-administered questionnaire was adopted to measure the prevalence of child abuse, Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9) questionnaire to grade the severity of depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7 (GAD-7) questionnaire to grade severity of anxiety. Interprofessional intervention interactive sessions with a psychologist, psychiatrist, and advocate were held after pre-test. Before and after the intervention, the participants' awareness and knowledge on various types of child abuse& negligence and legal policies were assessed.

RESULTS

The overall prevalence of child abuse in any form was 73.42 %. Physical abuse was the most frequent form, accounting for 65.26 %, followed by childhood negligence (62.63 %), emotional abuse (53.15 %), and sexual abuse (23.42 %). Higher incidence of psychological distress with depression (80 %) and anxiety (55.52 %) was observed in participants with previous history of childhood abuse. There was a significant improvement in the knowledge and awareness on various forms of child abuse and negligence (p < 0.05) and legal policies (16.05 % before intervention, 85.90 % after intervention) (p < 0.05) after intervention sessions with interprofessional members.

CONCLUSIONS

The interprofessional interactive sessions exhibited significant improvement in the knowledge and awareness in terms of child abuse and policies in all domains. Utmost need and necessity of including implementation of interprofessional intervention interactive sessions or counselling program in academic institutions specially in developing states where there is a lack of awareness and easy access to services.