Abstract :
Background: Depression among adolescent is an area of increasing concern worldwide. This study aimed
to assess the prevalence of depression among school going adolescents in government and private schools
in a rural area of block Beri of Haryana.
Methods: A cross sectional study was conducted in a sample size of 600 students (300 males and 300
females) studying in class 8th to 12th. A pre designed, pre tested tool SCL 90 R containing 90 items was used
to screen depression in these students. Depression is one of the psychiatric morbidity screened by this
tool. Cut off point of estimated raw score of 1 was used to label as depression. All the statistical analysis
was carried out using SPSS 20.
Results: The overall prevalence of depression was found to be 39.1% with mild depression to be 33.1% and
moderate to severe depression to be 6%. Depression was significantly more among female students (45%)
than male students (33.3%). Overall prevalence of depression significantly increased with age. It was found
to be 34.3% among 13-14 years age-group, 41% among 15-16 years age-group and 57.1% among 17-19
years age-group. The association of depression with other socio demographic profile like socio economic
status, literacy level of mother and father, employment status of mother was found to be non-significant.
Conclusion: It is concluded from the present study that more than one – third (39%) of school adolescents
suffered from depression. Reasons for such high prevalence of depression need to be determined. At the
same time teachers and parents should be made aware of this problem and appropriate counselling of
students should be done through regular school-based screening programme.
Keyword :
Depression, School adolescents, SCL 90 R tool