title: Common mental disorders in primary care in Harare, Zimbabwe: associations and risk factors.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  This study aimed to investigate the associations for common mental disorders (CMD) among primary care attenders in Harare.
  
  
  METHODS
  This was an unmatched case-control study of attenders at primary health clinics, general practitioner surgeries and traditional medical practitioner clinics; 199 cases with CMD as identified by an indigenously developed case-finding questionnaire, and 197 controls (non-cases), were interviewed using measures of sociodemographic data, disability, care-giver diagnoses and treatment, explanatory models, life events and alcohol use.
  
  
  RESULTS
  CMD was associated with female gender (P = 0.04) and older age (P = 0.02). After adjustment for age, gender and site of recruitment, CMD was significantly associated with chronicity of illness; number of presenting complaints; beliefs in "thinking too much" and witchcraft as a causal model; economic impoverishment; infertility; recent unemployment; an unhappy childhood for females; disability; and consultations with traditional medical practitioners and religious priests.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Mental disorders are associated with female gender, disability, economic deprivation, and indigenous labels of distress states.
authors.affiliation: University of Zimbabwe Medical School, Harare, Zimbabwe.
authors.forename: V
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Patel
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Todd
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Winston
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Gwanzura
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Simunyu
authors.forename: W
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Acuda
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Mann
mesh_terms: D000367:Age Factors; D000368:Aged; D017028:Caregivers; D016022:Case-Control Studies; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D008016:Life Change Events; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*; D012307:Risk Factors; D012737:Sex Factors; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D013001:Somatoform Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology; D015030:Zimbabwe / Q000453:epidemiology