title: Incidence of catatonia in children and adolescents in a paediatric psychiatric clinic.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To investigate the incidence and phenomenology of catatonia in a child and adolescent population.
  
  
  METHODS
  Children and adolescents who had attended a paediatric psychiatric outpatient clinic between April and July 2001 were examined for catatonic signs with a formal catatonia rating scale, and patients who had at least two catatonic signs were included.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Eleven patients met the criteria (5.5% of the entire sample and 17.7% of the patients with affective and nonaffective psychotic disorder); of them eight had an affective disorder and three a nonaffective disorder. The mean catatonic scores were significantly high for males and patients with mental retardation.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  This study shows that catatonia occurs in children and adolescents. Further studies are essential to clarify the distribution of catatonia across various diagnoses and the outcome of paediatric catatonia.
authors.affiliation: Central Institute of Psychiatry, Kanke (Po), Ranchi-834 006, Jharkhand, India. anupam_thakur2000@yahoo.com
authors.forename: Anupam
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Thakur
authors.forename: K
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Jagadheesan
authors.forename: Siddartha
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Dutta
authors.forename: Vinod Kumar
authors.initials: VK
authors.lastname: Sinha
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000553:Ambulatory Care; D002389:Catatonia / Q000175:diagnosis / Q000453:epidemiology* / Q000628:therapy*; D002648:Child; D002665:Child Psychiatry; D003937:Diagnosis, Differential; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008605:Mental Health Services; D016896:Treatment Outcome