WVXU: UC study examines hesitancy to treat childhood anxiety with medication
The University of Cincinnati's Jeffrey Strawn, MD, and Jeffrey Mills, PhD, recently published research that found only about 10% of children and adolescents with anxiety disorders opted to begin medication treatment after cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) did not lead to improvements.
Strawn, Mills and Angela Scott, PhD, a staff psychologist at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, recently joined Cincinnati Edition on WVXU to discuss the research.
"These are all kids who had pretty high quality CBT," Strawn said. "One of the things we’re thinking about is that there may be a shelf life for some of the treatments that we have and that if you don’t receive a certain amount of improvement by a certain point there’s almost kind of a giving up of some of these patients."
Patients from racial and ethnic minorities were three times less likely to begin medication treatment compared to white patients, and younger patients were also significantly less likely to begin medication. Parent and patient expectations of the effectiveness of treatments were also a predictor of whether they would opt to start medication treatment.
"What happens here is we don’t have a lot of other variables," Mills explained. "A variable such as white versus non-white stands in as a proxy representing a lot of other socioeconomic and cultural factors we just haven’t been able to measure. All these psychiatric studies tend to be outpatient, so the patient goes back to their environment, and that can be very different. Unfortunately race and minority is an indicator of that."
Scott said she was not surprised by the findings that racial and ethnic minorities were less likely to begin medication treatment.
"Anecdotally in working with patients of color, it’s more like it seems like they don’t feel that that’s for them if that makes sense. Like medication or mental health treament was created by white people, for white people," she said. "Having more representation in these clinical trials -- and when we do have really good representation, making sure that we’re disseminating that information, getting that out to the community so that people can see that yes these are efficacious treatments and they do work for even your group of people -- helps to dissuade some of the concern."
Listen to the Cincinnati Edition segment.
Featured photo at top of Strawn and Mills. Photo/University of Cincinnati.
Related Stories
Grad students earn president's highest honor
April 28, 2021
The University of Cincinnati 2021 Presidential Medal of Graduate Student Excellence Awards honor three graduate scholars for scholarship, leadership, character, service and the ideals of the university. Awardees are spotlighted for exceptional academics, creativity, community service and innovation.
UC student leads effort to clean up campus adjacent Coy Field
April 7, 2021
Karthikeyan Sakthivel, a senior medical sciences undergraduate at the University of Cincinnati, has adopted Coy Field in an attempt to keep the green space clean and ready for use by UC students, area high schoolers and the community. Sakthivel is planning another cleanup event for Coy Field, which is adjacent to the university campus.
GIVEHOPE and BSI Engineering Celebrate Ten Years of Driving Research
August 3, 2021
Years after two personal losses from pancreatic cancer, Cincinnati-based nonprofit GIVEHOPE and consulting firm BSI Engineering are celebrating a philanthropic partnership that has funded 13 pilot research projects at the University of Cincinnati Cancer Center.
Finding community and building a future
July 9, 2021
As a University of Cincinnati College of Medicine student, Sarah Appeadu, MD, ’21, remembers journaling on the “3 Cs” that got her through medical school: Community, community, community. Now, when she lists the people who supported her through four years of training—the last year in a global pandemic—it keeps growing: her family, her church, her classmates, and the college’s Office of Student Affairs and Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion. “I look back and it was such a crucial time to really be nurtured in that way,” she says. “I’m so thankful that I had those people. It shows being around the right people really mattered. That’s my same hope for residency even.”
New York Times: Flint Weighs Scope of Harm to Children Caused by Lead in Water
February 1, 2016
Kim Dietrich, a professor of environmental health at UC's College of Medicine, is quoted in this story on the medical problems that could develop among the thousands of young children exposed to lead-contaminated water in Flint, Mich.
Cancer-Causing Gene Found in Plasma May Help Predict Outcomes for Patients
February 18, 2016
Researchers at the University of Cincinnati have discovered that a human cancer-causing gene, called DEK, can be detected in the plasma of head and neck cancer patients.
UC Receives $1.9 Million to Study Pain
February 15, 2016
Jun-Ming Zhang, MD, of the UC College of Medicine, is the principal investigator of a $1.95 million grant to study the interacting roles of the sympathetic and sensory nervous and immune systems in back and neuropathic pain models.
MD Magazine: Generic Drug Equally Effective in Epilespy
February 22, 2016
Michael Privitera, MD, a professor of neurology at UC's College of Medicine and director of the Epilepsy Center at the UC Neuroscience Institute, is featured in this story about research he led that examined the efficacy of generic drug substitution for epilepsy.
UC to Host Regional Conference for Latino Medical Student Association
February 10, 2016
The University of Cincinnati chapter of the Latino Medical Student Association (LMSA) will host a Midwest regional conference Feb. 26-28, 2016, at the College of Medicine.
Heart Disease Still Top Killer of American Women and Men, Symptoms Differ
February 1, 2016
Women tend to get palpitations, shortness of breath and "sharp" chest pain when suffering heart attacks, explains Stephanie Dunlap, DO, in the UC College of Medicine.