ABSTRACT
BACKGROUND: The aim was to evaluate psychosocial symptoms and competence as reported by the parents and the adolescents themselves among patients with inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) in relation to population-based controls. METHODS: Standardized Achenbach questionnaires-Child Behavior Checklist (CBCL) for the parents and Youth Self-Report (YSR) for the adolescents-were sent to Finnish families of adolescents with IBD (age 10-18 years), and their controls matched for age, gender, and place of residence. The final study group comprised 160 adolescents with IBD and 236 controls with their parents, respectively. RESULTS: According to parent reports, adolescents with IBD had more symptoms of anxious/depressed mood (P < 0.001), withdrawn/depressed mood (P < 0.05), social problems (P < 0.05), thought problems (P < 0.001), somatic complaints (P < 0.001), and lower competence (P < 0.05) than population-based controls. Unexpectedly, there was no group difference in the amount of self-reported psychosocial symptoms, somatic complaints, or competence between adolescents with IBD and their peers. However, adolescents with severe IBD reported significantly more emotional problems (P < 0.001) than those with mild symptoms or controls. CONCLUSIONS: According to parents, adolescents with IBD have more emotional problems, social problems, thought problems, and lower competence than their population-based peers. Self-perceived severity of the IBD symptoms is associated with a larger amount of parent and self-reported emotional symptoms. Complementary methods should be used while assessing the psychosocial well-being of adolescents with IBD as questionnaires alone may be insufficient.
