Aims
and Objectives
To study the impact of
Covid-19 pandemic on mental health of school going children
Primary
Objective: Impact of Covid-19 pandemic on mental health of school going
children
Secondary
Objective: Compare the effects of covid-19 pandemic on children of Healthcare
workers (HCWs) and those from general population.
Material
and methods
Place of
study: Department of Pediatrics, ESI PGIMSR, Basaidarapur, New Delhi
Study
Design: It will be an observational cross sectional study
Sampling: Children will be enrolled in two groups. Group
A: Children of Health care workers and Group B: Children from general
population. We propose to recruit 50 children in each group by interviewing
their parent/ guardian. We will use the snowball sampling technique for the
same.
Inclusion
Criteria: School going children
aged 6-17 years of health care workers working in ESI PGIMSR and associated
hospital, Basaidarpur and from general population.
Exclusion
Criteria: Children with known psychiatric, neurological, developmental and
other chronic illnesses will be excluded.
Methodology:
DSM-5 Parent/Guardian-Rated Level 1 Cross-Cutting
Symptom Measure—Child Age 6–17 questionnaire will be used for evaluation.
This measure developed by American Psychiatric Association can be reproduced
without permission by researchers and by clinicians for use with their
patients. Necessary approval will be taken from IEC.
The DSM-5 Parent/Guardian-Rated Level
1 Cross-Cutting Symptom Measure—Child Age 6–17 assesses mental health domains
that are important across psychiatric diagnoses.
The measure consists of 25 questions
that assess 12 psychiatric domains, including depression, anger, irritability,
mania, anxiety, somatic symptoms, inattention, suicidal ideation/attempt,
psychosis, sleep disturbance, repetitive thoughts and behaviors, and substance
use.
Each item asks the parent or guardian to rate
how much (or how often) his or her child has been bothered by the specific
symptom during the past 2 weeks.
Nineteen of the 25 items on the measure are each rated on a
5-point scale (0=none or not at all; 1=slight or rare, less than a day or two;
2=mild or several days; 3=moderate or more than half the days; and 4=severe or
nearly every day). The suicidal ideation, suicide attempt, and substance abuse
items are each rated on a “Yes, No, or Don’t Know†scale. The score on each
item within a domain will be reviewed by clinician. A guide provided in the
manual will help clinician outline the threshold score to interpret whether the
symptom is worrisome and needs further inquiry or not.
A questionnaire comprising demographic details, questions from
DSM-5 and few self prepared questions regarding covid-19 will be sent to HCWs
working in ESI PGIMSR for group A and known contacts of the investigators for
group B. The answers will be received back online. Results from both the groups
will be analyzed and compared using standard protocols.
Outcome
measures
Primary
Outcome measures: Prevalence of psychosocial problems among the Indian
school going children during the pandemic covid-19
Secondary
Outcome measures: comparison of perception of covid -19 by
children of Indian HCWs and those from general population.
|