Adolescent Depression and Intervention

Abstract

The paper describes and criticizes the case study done on preventing depression in youth in primary care setting. It analyses the methods, sample, and results and interpretation of results and discusses all the relevant factors related to the study. All the sections are discussed below.

Adolescent Depression and Intervention

Thesis Statement

The depression and suicide are prevalent in youth; there is a need to evaluate the studies relevant to depression in adolescent to find out the most effective strategy for the management of depression.

Introduction

Depression is common among teens, with a rate of 4-8% of in any year, and 20% of youths experience a depressive disorder at the age of 16-18 years of life. Many youths have high or subclinical symptoms of depression (Zuckerbot, Maxon, Pagar, Davies, Fisher, & Shaffer, 2007). Depression is mostly not identified in adolescents, although, it has become epidemic in the country. In US, one in five may get depression and it is the second important cause of disability in young and middle age people. It is highly prevalent but there are fewer treatment options available for adolescent mental health .The consequences of this treatment gap are devastating it may lead to serious issues later in life, even cause suicide. For depressive adolescents, the suicidal thinking rates are very high.

About three million youth think seriously about suicide and more than 200% attempted suicide in the year 2000 (Zuckerbot, Maxon, Pagar, Davies, Fisher, & Shaffer, 2007).Those teens had undiagnosed depression and had serious difficulties in schooling, and managing personal relationships. Due of these reasons, adolescent depression has recognized as a serious disorder.

The depression can be managed; there is debate about the kind of therapy that can most effectively target adolescent depression. There is a need to implement effective management programs. Cognitive-behavioral interventions, are one of the strategies that are efficacious for managing depression. These management interventions teach the patients cognitive-restructuring skills. Relapse rates are also less for youths who get cognitive-behavioral therapy. This fact has led the research groups to search that cognitive-behavioral therapy can prevent these symptoms. Several depression prevention programs are implemented for treating depression (Zuckerbot, Maxon, Pagar, Davies, Fisher, & Shaffer, 2007).

This paper critically analyzes the research study done on youth depression. It is written by Gillham, Hamilton, Freres, Patton, and Gallop, it was published in Journal of Abnormal Child Psychology in 2006 with the title, “Preventing Depression Among Early Adolescents in the Primary Care Setting: A Randomized Controlled Study of the Penn Resiliency Program.” This case study assessed the effectiveness of Penn Resiliency Program in management of depression in a primary care setting. Case study involved 11 to 12-year-old youths, with depression, were given PRP or usual care. After 2-year , PRP group showed improvement in depressive symptoms and PRP did not prove to prevent the disorders (Gillham, et. al., 2006).

Literature Review

Adolescence is a time when psychological restructuring occurs. Most adolescents lack coping skills to manage the painful events associated with this ...