EPIDEMIOLOGICAL AND PHENOMENOLOGICAL FEATURES OF OBSESSIVE COMPULSIVE DISORDER IN 9-15 YEARS OLD CHILDREN AND ADOLESCENTS IN BURSA SAMPLING

Abstract

Aim is to investigate incidence, sociodemographic characteristics and phenomenology of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder in children and adolescents in a sampling group from Bursa central districts. Participants included randomly selected 4-8th grade students and their parens attending elementary schools during 1997-1998. Survey covering OCD criteria was disseminated. 805 students, aged 11,99 ± 1,39 years, presenting at least one symptom, were interviewed. Incidence of OCD and subclinical OCD was 9.9% for each. Male / female ratio in OCD, is approximately equal. Forms of obsessions were; fear (50%), thoughts (28.9%) and suspicion (15%) and the most comon forms of compulsions were ritualistic behaviors (57.5%), controlling (43.8%) and repetition (36.3%) in the OCD group. Compared to literature, cleaning and hand washing compulsions were found to be less with a range of 21.3% . It was concluded that in social sampling groups of OCD, there may be culture specific sequencial changes in frequency of symptoms.