"My daughter is cut": by pandemic, psychiatric consultations increased in boys and worry the autolesions

For experts, the great challenge is to recover the social bond of boys with psychiatric pathologies;a bond that they lost during strict isolation

The trigger was just a shout of his eight -year -old brother, who was playing the play.Had never happened before.Isabella, 14, was disheveled.He began to shout, to throw objects, broke a glass and tried to hit his mother, who did not know what to do.The overflow lasted a few minutes and after that, he fell asleep for ten hours in a row.When awakening, it was as if nothing had happened.The parents were worried, they consulted their pediatrician and the psychologist who was treating her since they discovered that the teenager was injured.They were small leg wounds and arms, more and more frequent.The overflows were repeated a few days later.To the slightest stimulus, the outbreak returned.This time, the psychologist and the pediatrician agreed that a psychiatrist had to participate in the treatment.The resistance came when, after studying the case, the specialist told them that the teenager had a deep depression, a lot of anguish and anxiety, enhanced by the pandemic confinement, and proposed to give him psychiatric medication to start working.The parents at first did not want to know anything.“It's very small, how are we going to medicate.There must be another way, ”said his mother.Finally, when they saw that the situation was uncontrollable for them, and after consulting other specialists, they agreed to start treatment with psychopharmaceuticals.

It is not an isolated case and the issue worries the experts, who confirm that in recent months they have noticed a significant increase in psychiatric consultations in adolescents and children and also that there is an increase in the prescription and sale of medication of thisType for treatments.

Risperidone and aripiprazole are the two psychotropic women who are most using psychiatrists in children and adolescents: “They are atypical neuroleptics and function as behavioral regulators.They aim to regulate the psychic apparatus.But medication is not all the treatment, it is just a fertilizer for psychotherapy to work, ”explains Andrea Abadi, psychiatrist and director of the Infantosjvenile Department of Ineco.

The sale of Aripiprazole, in the country, grew so far this year by 13% with respect to 2020, a period in which they did not have a fall in sales, they describe to La Nacion from IQVIA, an international consulting firm of market researchPharmaceutical, specialized in health science.The risperidone had a 5% growth, with 5% peaks in recent months.It is worth clarifying that this is not an exclusively pediatric drug, so it is difficult to measure what proportion corresponds to medicated children and adolescents.

Risperidone and aripiprazole are antipsychotic chemical compounds that act by modifying the activity of certain natural substances in the brain, it is explained at the site of the National Library of Medicine of the United States.They are generally used for the treatment of schizophrenia and bipolar disorder, among others.They also go to regulate behavioral problems such as aggressiveness, self -injuries and sudden changes in mood.In addition, to attack depression when symptoms cannot be controlled only with antidepressants.And to control behaviors such as aggression, tantrums and frequent humor changes in children with autism.

The causes

The increase in the use of psychiatric medication in minors concerns the Argentine Pediatrics Society (SAP)."The use of pediatric psychiatric medication is indicated exclusively to prevent the boy.“This is, a situation that puts its own life, its development and its relationship with the environment at risk.But of course that the increase in the indication of psychiatric medication in children should worry us.Above all, for what marks.This is part of the consequences of the pandemic: the boys lived environments without routines, very destructure of their psyche, in family contexts where coexistence in many cases resulted in violence, where they lost the links with the peers and the outside with the outside.In addition, where virtual therapies did not have the same impact as face -to -face.The great challenge is to recover the bond of these guys with society, ”explains Bakalarz.

"Child psychiatrists are overwhelmed.Parents who go through these crises know it.They are practically not achieved shifts.The effects of pandemic are becoming very evident in this time on boys, ”says Abadi.“With the return to classes the situation decompresses a little, but not quite, because the boys did not return to their lives.There are no real exchange spaces with their peers as before.And many boys who already had a predisposition saw their paintings aggravated during the pandemic, ”he adds.

Marina Manzione, a psychologist specializing in childhood and adolescence, was part of the pioneering team, an interdisciplinary group that made a diagnosis of the emotional situation of adolescents in pandemic.In your office more and more extreme cases of adolescents receive that require the participation of a psychiatrist and the use of medication.

Injuries

What they are noticing in recent months, specialists coincide, is an increase in cases of boys who adopt self -colonies and even in extreme cases trying to commit suicide."This is very worrying and you have to put an alert," says Abadi.And complete: "The consultations were increasing, but in the last two months we see a prevalence of boys 12 years and older with attempts at suicide and self -notjurias".In some cases, self -injuries imply superficial cuts in arms and legs.They are wounded not visible to parents, because they are under clothes, but they become unstoppable behavior.A few years ago, with the famous Blue Whale game, many teenagers began to self -harm.Now, due to the prolonged feeling of uncertainty and the anguish that the pandemic brought, the cases become increasingly frequent in the offices.

"It's hard to understand why they do.It is something that produces temporary relief in their anguish crises.It is a way of discharge, in many cases it is not related to the idea of suicide, but it can be dangerous anyway.In others, the idea of taking his life appears later, ”explains Manzion.

“Most of the time these cuts are not aimed at suicide.Instead, they are cut to feel that they are alive.Who can feel something.Because the great existential dilemma they are going through is that they cannot feel, ”explains Abadi.

Taboo

Sofia is 17 years old and since the pandemic began, her parents hardly recognize her.He became very retracted.Of being a brilliant teenager and a great student, to almost not connect to school zoom.In addition, he stopped frequenting friends, even when the restrictions were built.He began to be very aware of his image.Her mother took her to the psychologist, because she believed she was anorexic.When the specialist attended her, she discovered that this was the slightest of her problems.Depression was so acute that I was seriously thinking about suicide.It was then that the intervention of a psychiatrist and medication arrived.The parents also resisted, but then they understood what the specialists raised.You had to take it out of the risk zone to start working your emotions in therapy.For five months that it is in treatment and the changes were notorious.A few weeks ago he returned to school.He started writing what he was living, his parents got involved in recovery and, little by little, he is recovering the desire to live.

In any case, the increase in the use of psychiatric medication in the pediatric population turns on an alert.And in many cases, the boy's parents who are going through this situation refuse to consume them.

“There is a great taboo on the use of psychiatric medication in pediatrics.Obviously, that before indicating it you must do all the valuations that assure us that it is the treatment that boy requires.But part of the parents' fear has to believe that it is for a lifetime and it is not so.In addition, we must understand that it is part of the treatment, which includes psychotherapy, among other things, and that requires family participation, ”explains Abadi.

Pathologies

Some of the pathologies that increased their incidence in adolescents during pandemic, explains Bakalarz are nerve anorexias.“They increased a lot, the boys are very alone.They lived the pandemic in solitude.With the return to school, the situation improved quite a lot, but within the houses, the pandemic activated a family conflict bomb.Therefore, we see an increase in all pathologies linked to excessive contact with the family, ”he says.

Cases of posttraumatic stress also increased, due to fear of disease, in acute and chronic paintings, which can lead to sleep and anxiety disorder.There is also an increase in the paintings of boys and adolescents with compulsive obsessive disorders (TOC)."Obsessive mechanism is a way of organizing a thought.There is a disorganization that defends itself with the obsessive organization, ”explains Bakalarz.“We notice outbreaks of obsessive disorders in childhood, excessive care for not getting dirty.The idea of pollution and death generated a lot of vulnerability, ”adds Abadi.

Changes in sleep rhythms in adolescents during the last year and a half have not yet managed to revert with the return to face -to -face classes.This can be one of the explanations of anxiety disorders, says Manzion.“The teenagers during the confine.Then they connected how they could school and slept in the afternoon.But with the return to classes, he became unsustainable.And they got used to sleeping little, but this generates many alterations in behavior.It is something that parents should pay attention.Also evaluate the mood of your children.How many do you want to do the things they do.Because that is a great indicator, ”concludes the specialist.

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