Treatment
It is estimated that 5% of children under the age of eight suffer from a psychopathology disorder. Girls more frequently manifested disorders than boys in similar situations. By age sixteen about thirty percent of children will have fit the criteria for at least one psychopathology disorder. Only a small number of these children receive treatment for their disorder. Anxiety and depression disorders in children- whether noted or unnoted, are found to be a precursor for similar episodes in adulthood. Usually a large stressor similar to the one the person experienced in childhood brings out the anxiety or depression in adulthood.
Multifinality refers to the idea that two children can react totally different to same stressful event and display divergent types of problem behavior. Psychopathological disorders are extremely situational- having to take into account the child, the genetics, the environment, the stressor, and many other factors to tailor the best type of treatment to relieve the child of the psychopathology symptoms.
Many child psychopathology disorders are treated with control medications prescribed by a pediatrician or psychiatrist. After extensive evaluation of the child through school, psychologists, and physicians a medication can be prescribed. The medicines can take as little as a day to achieve effectiveness or as long as four to eight weeks. At times, a child goes through several trials of medicines to find the best fit, as many cause uncomfortable and undesired side effects- such as dry mouth or suicidal thoughts. There are many classes of drugs a physician can choose from and they are: psychostimulants, beta blockers, atypical anti psychotics, lithium, alpha-2 agonists, traditional antipsychotics, SSRI’s, and anticonvulsant mood- stabilizers. Given the multifinality of psychopathological disorders, two children may be on the same medication for two completely different disorders, or have the same disorder and be taking two completely different medications.
ADHD is the most successfully treated disorder of child psychopathology, and the medications used have a high- abuse rate especially among college-aged students. Psycho stimulants such as Ritalin, amphetamine- related stimulant drugs: e.g., Adderall, and antidepressants such as Wellbutrin have been successfully used to treat ADHD with a 78% success rate. Many of these drug treatment options are paired with behavioral treatment such as therapy or social skills lessons.
Lithium has shown to be extremely effective in treating ADHD and bipolar disorder. Lithium treats both mania and depression and helps prevent relapse. The mechanism of lithium include the inhibition of GSK-3, it is a glutamate antagonism at NMDA receptors that together make lithium a neuroprotective medicine. The drug relieves bipolar symptoms, aggressiveness and irritability. Lithium has many, many side effects and requires weekly blood tests to tests for toxicity of the drug.
Medications that act on cell membrane ion channels, are GABA inhibitory neurotransmission, and also inhibit excitatory glutamate transmission have shown to be extremely effective in treating an array of child psychopathological disorders. Pharmaceutical companies are in the process of creating new drugs and improving those on the market to help avoid negative and possibly life altering short term and long term side effects, making the drug more safe to use in younger children and over long periods of time during adolescent development.
Read more about this topic: Child Psychopathology
Famous quotes containing the word treatment:
“I feel that any form of so called psychotherapy is strongly contraindicated for addicts.... The question “Why did you start using narcotics in the first place?” should never be asked. It is quite as irrelevant to treatment as it would be to ask a malarial patient why he went to a malarial area.”
—William Burroughs (b. 1914)
“[17th-century] Puritans were the first modern parents. Like many of us, they looked on their treatment of children as a test of their own self-control. Their goal was not to simply to ensure the child’s duty to the family, but to help him or her make personal, individual commitments. They were the first authors to state that children must obey God rather than parents, in case of a clear conflict.”
—C. John Sommerville (20th century)
“If the study of all these sciences, which we have enumerated, should ever bring us to their mutual association and relationship, and teach us the nature of the ties which bind them together, I believe that the diligent treatment of them will forward the objects which we have in view, and that the labor, which otherwise would be fruitless, will be well bestowed.”
—Plato (c. 427–347 B.C.)