Obsessive-compulsive disorder in children and adolescents: predictors in childhood for long-term phenomenological course.

Prediction of the phenomenological course of obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) in adulthood was determined in 47 probands referred in childhood for in- or outpatient treatment for OCD. The only factor that predicted a poor outcome, defined as the presence of OCD in adulthood, was severity of OCD in childhood, as measured by the duration of the obsessive-compulsive symptoms. More females than males had an episodic course of OCD. However, just as many females as males had OCD, either chronically or episodically, in adulthood. Age of onset did not predict the phenomenological course of OCD.