Research Assessment #3

Name:

Meghan Reed

Date:

21 September 2017

MLA Citation:

Kataoka, Sheryl H., et al. Unmet Need for Mental Health Care Among U.S. Children. The

American Journal of Psychiatry, vol. 159, no. 9, 1 Sept. 2002, pp. 15481555.,

ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/pdf/10.1176/appi.ajp.159.9.1548.

Assessment:

For this research assessment, I decided to start researching about mental health in

pediatric patients and children. This is very interesting to me as I almost chose Psychology for

my topic of study in ISM before I ultimately decided on Pediatrics, so if I can combine the two I

would be very interested. It is a well-known fact that mental health issues are greatly mistreated

in all age ranges, but especially in children. Children are rarely diagnosed with mental illnesses,

learning disorders, and behavioral disorders due to the fact people believe these children will

grow out of it by the time they grow up and they do not want to misdiagnose a child. However,

this leads to many children who need to be treated not being diagnosed due to how society views

and treats mental health.

In this article, the researchers aimed to find the percentage of children that receive mental

health treatments and care as well as how the percentage changes based on different minorities

and variables such as whether or not the family of the child is insured or uninsured. The article
came to the conclusion that children that are either African American or Latino were less likely

than their Caucasian counterparts to receive medical treatment and care for mental illnesses and

all uninsured children were less likely to receive care compared to insured children. This is a

problem because even insured, caucasian children with mental illnesses do not get properly

treated approximately 75% of the time, and the amount that is untreated or treated wrong only

increases for children without insurance or that are of a minority.

This article was very interesting to me as it reinforced the idea that as a Pediatrician, I

should be focusing on not only the physical health of my patients, but also the mental health of

every single patient that I see. For most mental illnesses, it does not take a Psychologist to

diagnose or suspect, and a Pediatrician will also be able to refer patients to Psychologists if they

deem that to be necessary. This article study showed me that I can take my career in more ways

than in primary care, and it may be beneficial to look into child psychology or something relating

to that field.

Going forward with my ISM journey, I am interested in continuing my research on child

psychology and mental health, and may potentially look into interviewing with some child

psychologists for informational interviews in order to learn more about the topic. For the next

research assessment, I hope to stay on track of psychology and possibly research the effects of a

terminal illness or severe disease on a child. This is very interesting to me as it still has to do

with psychology, however, it also deals with the medical area of Pediatrics by dealing with

terminal illnesses and diseases. This would be a nice happy medium between the two subjects I

find greatly interesting, and I am interested in learning more about it in the future.