Abstract
Adolescents with deafness exhibit higher mental health problems when compared with their hearing peers. There is limited information on the mental health problems of adolescents with deafness living in the sub-Saharan Africa. The aim of this study was to determine the prevalence of mental health problems in a group of deaf adolescents and the relationship with socio-demographic characteristics and to compare with their hearing counterparts. Materials and Methods: Teachers of 102 deaf adolescents and 102 age- and sex-matched hearing adolescents completed the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ). Severity of deafness was assessed using Pure Tone Audiometry, using a five-frequency average. Results: The results showed that 88.2% and 11.8% of the deaf participants had profound and severe forms of deafness respectively. The prevalence of behavioural problems was significantly higher in the deaf adolescents than the control, as assessed by their teachers’ (64.3% vs. 35.7%; p < 0.001). Ninety seven percent of the deaf participants reported no hearing aids use. Parental separation/divorce and mother’s educational status were significantly associated with higher rates of behavioural problems (p < 0.05). There was no significant association between severity of impairment and mental health problems. Conclusion: Almost all the factors associated with deafness that are highlighted in this study are preventable through appropriate health and social interventions such as hearing aids, and will require that appropriate policy measures are put in place.
Highlights
There appears to be no information on the prevalence and correlates of mental health problems among deaf adolescents living in sub-Saharan Africa
The available studies done among deaf adolescents living in Africa mostly focused on other comorbidities especially HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and sexual abuse [1, 2]
This lack of information is despite the fact that 25% of the 32 million children and adolescents with deafness worldwide live in Africa [3]
Summary
The available studies done among deaf adolescents living in Africa mostly focused on other comorbidities especially HIV/AIDS, reproductive health and sexual abuse [1, 2]. This lack of information is despite the fact that 25% of the 32 million children and adolescents with deafness worldwide live in Africa [3]. In Nigeria, a study that was done among children and adolescents found a prevalence of 39.4% of different degrees of deafness [4] This high prevalence of deafness in developing countries is considered to be a consequence of factors such as high prevalence of preventable childhood infections, absent or inadequate screening programmes for ear diseases [5], poor access to health care and a lack of adequate vaccines [3]
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