BMJ  2005;330:418 (19 February), doi:10.1136/bmj.330.7488.418-a

Letter

Rethinking childhood depression

Consider what it means to be a child these days

The first 150 words of the full text of this article appear below.

EDITOR—What we, as clinical practitioners (or, as in my own case, former practitioner, now service coordinator), may need to learn is that the supposedly patently obvious is often obscured by our particular conditioned professional mindsets. The mindsets are influenced by the sociopolitics of healthcare delivery, and by, I suspect, an overly major focus on the individual (at the expense of the social and collective).

With regard to rethinking childhood depression,¹ children these days are getting much less regular physical exercise than they used to 20 or so years ago and fewer opportunities exist for exercise. The prescribing of antidepressant drugs has gone through the roof in the past decade. Children now don't have the opportunities for essential play, to be a part of a social support network, or to be part of a cogent extended or otherwise "family" (read, again, "social support network"). They also do not have . . . [Full text of this article]

Kaiyu Community Based Activities Programme, PO Box 74, Mayfield, NSW 2304, Australia bicycle@kooee.com.au

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