title: Early-adult outcome of child and adolescent mental disorders as evidenced by a national-based case register survey.
abstract: Mental disorders show varying degrees of continuity from childhood to adulthood. This study addresses the relationship of child and adolescent mental disorders to early adult psychiatric morbidity.
  
  
  
  From a population at risk of 830,819 children and adolescents aged 6-16 years, we selected all those (n=6043) who were enrolled for the first time in the Danish Psychiatric Register with an ICD-10 F00-99 diagnosis in 1995-1997, and identified any mental disorder for which they received treatment up to 2009.
  
  
  
  Neurodevelopmental and conduct disorders were the principal diagnostic groups at 6-16 years and exhibited a characteristic male preponderance; while affective, eating, neurotic, stress-related and adjustment disorders were more common in girls. Over a mean follow-up period of 10.1 years, 1666 (27.6%) cases, mean age 23.4 years, were referred for treatment to mental health services, and they had a markedly higher risk than the general population (RR 5.1; 95% CI 4.9-5.4). Affective, eating, neurodevelopmental, obsessive-compulsive and psychotic disorders had the strongest continuity. Heterotypic transitions were observed for affective, eating, neurodevelopmental, personality and substance use disorders.
  
  
  
  These findings suggest that individuals with psychiatric antecedents in childhood and adolescence had a high risk of being referred for treatment in early adulthood, and many mental disorders for which they required treatment revealed both homotypic and heterotypic continuity.
authors.affiliation: Centre for Psychiatric Research, Aarhus University Hospital, Risskov, Denmark. Electronic address: augusto.castagnini@unimore.it.
authors.forename: A C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Castagnini
authors.affiliation: Unit for Behaviour and Stress Biology, Department of Animal Science, and Bioinformatics Research Centre, Aarhus University, Denmark.
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Foldager
authors.affiliation: Department of Clinical and Diagnostic Medicine and Public Health, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy.
authors.forename: E
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Caffo
authors.affiliation: Centre for Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Aarhus University Hospital, and Department of Clinical Medicine, Aarhus University, Denmark.
authors.forename: P H
authors.initials: PH
authors.lastname: Thomsen
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000296:Adolescent Psychiatry; D000328:Adult; D000367:Age Factors; D002648:Child; D002665:Child Psychiatry; D005260:Female; D005500:Follow-Up Studies; D006801:Humans; D038801:International Classification of Diseases; D008297:Male; D001523:Mental Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000523:psychology; D010552:Personality Assessment; D012042:Registries; D019966:Substance-Related Disorders / Q000175:diagnosis; D011795:Surveys and Questionnaires; D055815:Young Adult
keywords: Continuity; Epidemiology; ICD-10; Nosology