Definition Obsessive-compulsive disorder, or OCD, means that the child suffers from excessive worries, which he or she often tries to overcome by doing what could be called superstitious rituals. For example, a child might worry that something dreadful will happen …
Background Bipolar mood disorder, earlier known as manic-depressive illness, was formerly a diagnosis given only to adults. The concept that children could also be given this diagnosis first appeared in Sweden in 1969, but did not become popular until an …
The term ‘neuropsychiatric disorder’ is used for any psychiatric problem whose cause is unknown but believed by many professionals to be the result of some kind of disturbance in brain functioning. Put simply, when “neuro” is attached to the words …
Diagnosis When children are disobedient, negative, and oppositional, trying the patientce of the adults, they may get the diagnosis oppositional defiant disorder also known as ODD. This is not an illness, or an independent disturbance, but a medical term describing …
The term ‘selective mutism’ is used for children who speak normally when they’re at home but don’t want or dare to speak with anyone outside their family. In typical cases, a child is talkative at home but doesn’t say a …
Background Diagnosing children as suffering from depression is a relatively new practice, this diagnosis was not used before the turn of the millennium. Unhappy children were earlier considered to have Adjustment Disorder with Depressive Symptoms, where “Adjustment Disorder” means a …