[Long term outcome of children diagnosed with resignation syndrome in the Stockholm Region 2005-2012]

Abstract

In the early 2000s, some children in asylum seeking families in Sweden showed severe reduction in function, including pervasive refusal to eat, drink, walk, talk or care for themselves. In 2014 this was to be named the resignation syndrome (ICD-10 F32.3A). The purpose of our study was to compare education and health-related outcomes over time between those with and without these symptoms, in a group of children from Central Asia who have been asylum seekers and received a residence permit in Sweden. We found that between the years 2005-2012, in the child and adolescent mental health services (CAMHS) in the Stockholm Region, 103 children showed symptoms of resignation, of whom 43 (43%) showed the most severe symptoms. Children with resignation syndrome assessed and cared for by CAMHS had similar need of outpatient care as other children of the same origin who had been treated by CAMHS for other conditions. They did not have an increased need for inpatient care compared with other children of the same origin, and they passed upper secondary school and past-secondary education to the same extent as other children of the same origin.