Prevalence and Co-occurrence of Major Depression and Generalized Anxiety Disorders Among Adolescents in Qatar

Background: Depression and anxiety are the commonest mental health disorders worldwide (1). In Qatar, a cross-sectional study conducted among Qatari adolescents in secondary schools in 2017 found that 34.5% have depression with female pre-dominance (5), but no study in Qatar has addressed both disorders co-occurrence. Objectives: The main objective is to assess the prevalence and co-occurrence of major depression disorder and generalized anxiety disorder in adolescents in Qatar. Research participants: adolescents aged 12-18 years old. Method: Cross-sectional study. An online questionnaire including Demographic data, PHQ-9 and GAD-7 will be sent to parents or legal guardians to take online consent, then to be filled in by their children in the ages of 12-18 years old. Proposed analysis: Chi-square test will be used to test the significance of association between variables. The significant level for all statistical analysis was set at 0.05. Anticipated result: According to a previous local study in Qatar we expect the prevalence of both disorders in this age group to be around 30% if not more and as per worldwide studies result 25-50% of depressed patient have anxiety also and 10-15% who have anxiety found to have depression as comorbidity, so we expect to have co-occurrences in this range.