[Early detection to prevent mental illness during adolescence: ethical and theoretical considerations]

Abstract

In the face of changes that characterise adolescence, a number of youth experience ill-being, as part of a normal developmental process. For some of them, however, this ill-being may represent early signs of a psychopathological process. Regarding depression and psychosis, such early signs are non-specific, which complicates and delays treatment. In addition, issues such as stigmatization and unfamiliarity with these psychopathologies represent major obstacles to treatment access. Attempts to early detection, which involves identifying risk factors in order to provide support and follow-up, making an effort to take these clinical signs seriously, while at the same time avoiding to mistake a normal developmental process for a pathological condition.