EFFECTIVENESS OF AN INTERNATIONAL CHILD AND ADOLESCENT MENTAL HEALTH (ICAMH) TRAINING ON PEDIATRIC RESIDENTS’ KNOWLEDGE, ATTITUDES AND IDENTIFICATION SKILLS OF COMMON CHILD MENTAL HEALTH PROBLEMS

Abstract

Introduction : Child and adolescent mental health problems are important public health concerns. In low-income and middle-income countries (LMIC), where there is very few trained specialists, training of non-specialist health workers gives a wider entry point for early identification of mental health problems and timely intervention.

Objective: To assess the effectiveness of International Child and Adolescent Mental Health (iCAMH) training on residents’ knowledge about common child psychiatric disorders, their attitude towards the importance of child mental health issues for their profession, and clinical skills in identifying mental health problems.

Methods: A before-after study with the intervention of a clinical course on child and adolescent mental health (CAMH) given to final year pediatrics residents at Addis Ababa University. Wilcoxon Signed Rank test was used to detect pre and post training differences.

Results: Eleven out of 17 (64.7%) of the final years pediatric residents were trained. Their post-training attitude (median=79.6) and clinical skill score (median=83.3) were significantly higher than their respective pre-training scores (median=74.1), (median=50.0) respectively, p = 003. However, the posttraining knowledge score (median=60.0) was not statistically different from the pre-training score (median=55.0), p = 092.

Conclusion: We found that there was a significant change in attitude, and clinical skills of pediatric residents in case detection after short in-service training. Short course training on child and adolescent mental health should be included in training pediatric residents in LMIC where there are very few child psychiatrists and other trained health professionals in the field to address CAMH problems