A study by Joseph Blader, PhD of psychiatric hospitalization rates for American children and adolescents is the subject of the lead article in the January 2011 issue of Clinical Psychiatry News. Dr. Blader’s analysis was first presented at the Annual meeting of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry this past December.
During the twelve years inclusive of 1996 and 2007, Dr. Blader’s study shows, the rate at which American children aged five to thirteen were hospitalized with a primary diagnosis of psychiatric disorder rose from 15.6 per 10,000 to 28.3 per 10,000, an increase of 81%, while the rate for adolescents grew 42%. During the same period, there was a shift away from private payers to governmental programs, primarily Medicaid. The data was drawn from the National Hospital Discharge Survey, a representative nation-wide database maintained by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Dr. Blader is Assistant Professor of Psychiatry in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Science at Stony Brook University. Clinical Psychiatry News is an independent newsletter for psychiatrists with a circulation of 37,000.
