Prevalence of psychotic symptoms in childhood and adolescence: a systematic review and meta-analysis of population-based studies.
BACKGROUND
Psychotic symptoms occur more frequently in the general population than psychotic disorder and index risk for psychopathology. Multiple studies have reported on the prevalence of these symptoms using self-report questionnaires or clinical interviews but there is a lack of consensus about the prevalence of psychotic symptoms among children and adolescents.


METHODS
We conducted a systematic review of all published literature on psychotic symptom prevalence in two age groups, children aged 9-12 years and adolescents aged 13-18 years, searching through electronic databases PubMed, Ovid Medline, PsycINFO and EMBASE up to June 2011, and extracted prevalence rates.


RESULTS
We identified 19 population studies that reported on psychotic symptom prevalence among children and adolescents. The median prevalence of psychotic symptoms was 17% among children aged 9-12 years and 7.5% among adolescents aged 13-18 years.


CONCLUSIONS
Psychotic symptoms are relatively common in young people, especially in childhood. Prevalence is higher in younger (9-12 years) compared to older (13-18 years) children.
Department of Psychiatry, Royal College of Surgeons in Ireland, and St Joseph's Adolescent Unit, St Vincent's Hospital Fairview, Dublin, Ireland. iankelleher@rcsi.ie
I
I
Kelleher
D
D
Connor
M C
MC
Clarke
N
N
Devlin
M
M
Harley
M
M
Cannon
D000293:Adolescent; D002648:Child; D003702:Delusions / Q000453:epidemiology; D006212:Hallucinations / Q000453:epidemiology; D006801:Humans; D015995:Prevalence; D011618:Psychotic Disorders / Q000453:epidemiology*