Socioeconomic Status, Race and Parental Initial Response to Children’s Mental Illness

To examine how socioeconomic status (SES) and race affect parents' initial response (IR) to their child’s mental illness (MI) including 1. Parental confidant(s); 2. Lag time in professional help-seeking; and 3. Referral source. 70 parents of patients new to a Child Psychiatry clinic completed a survey to assess their IR to their child’s MI. SES was determined using the United States Census Bureau median income by zip codes. Summary statistics are frequencies and percentages for categorical data, and medians and quartiles for continuous data. Twenty-five percent of parents reported low SES and 31% Non-Caucasian Children (NCC). Confidants of Caucasian and NCC were Pediatrician (77% vs 50%, p = 0.03), and family (73% vs 32%, p = 0.002). Comparing help-seeking Lag Times 66% reported a delay of 1 year or more (p = 0.040). Overall Pediatricians were the leading confidant. Lag times were one year or more with stronger trends in NCC.