Project 173146

Knowledge about children's mental health is critical, as most adult mental disorders originate in childhood and 14% of children suffer from mental disorders that cause impairment in their lives. There are effective programs to prevent the development of mental health problems. If we can identify the children at risk at an early age, we can target interventions at these children and minimize the impact of mental health problems. The objective of this proposed project is to link existing clinical and administrative databases in British Columbia (BC) in order to study the association between the developmental status of children in kindergarten and their use of mental health services for significant mental health problems in later childhood. These databases include the (1) EDI ¿ results of an instrument that assesses children¿s social, emotional and cognitive development and that is administered to all kindergarten children in BC; and (2) the CARIS and BCFPI ¿ electronic systems which track the children and youth referred to community mental health services in BC and also assess their symptoms and functioning. In this project, we will negotiate agreements with data holders to access these databases, arrange for linkage to be performed, and assess the outcome of the linkage. Once linkage is successfully completed, we can conduct further research to investigate whether the dimensions of early child development in the EDI predict the emergence of mental health problems and use of mental health services in later childhood. Such knowledge will increase our understanding of the risk factors for mental disorders in children, facilitate the early identification of children at risk and greatly benefit the development of policies and programs to prevent mental health problems.