Community Medicine Abstracts - College of Medicine and Health ...

Project No. 247 (2008)Prevalence of Anxiety, Depression and Suicidal Behaviour Among Residents ofLabour Camps in Al Ain City, UAEStudent Authors: Khalifa Mohammed Saif Al Kaabi, Essa Abdulla Ibrahim Hassan AlHaj, Dhafer Mohammed Amin Khonji, Rashid Yousif Rashid Al SharhanFaculty Supervisors: Dr. F. Maskari, Dr. S. Shah, Dr. J. Schneider, Dr. R. BernsenAbstract:Objectives: Depression, anxiety and suicide significantly influence the human who iscontinuously exposed to stress. One of the society groups who is under considerableamount of stress are the workers. The objective of this study was to determine theprevalence of anxiety, depression and suicidality among workers in labour camps in AlAin, UAE.Methods: This was a cross-sectional study. We selected a random sample (n=318)from a sampling frame of laborer camps of various sizes located in Ali Ain. We usedDASS-42 to assess depression and sucidality among the study participants. Thecollected data were analyzed by univariate and multivariate logistic regression alalysisusing the SPSS program.Results: Out of 318 study participants, 239 completed and returned the survey. Theprevalence of depression was 25.1% (60/239). The highest prevalence of depressionwas noted among laborers from Bangladesh (40%), followed by non-national Arabs(37.5%) and Pakistani (30%), and Indians (13.8%). Prevalence of depression variedby monthly earning i.e. 53.8% among those earning less than 500 DHS, 26.8% inincome category of 500-999 DHS, and 20% in income category of >=1000 DHS. 7%of the participants thought about killing themselves. 3% of the same group really triedto do so. The most common method to commit suicide was hanging. Those who sufferfrom depression have attributed their symptoms to having no regular annual vacation.Conclusion: Laborers are having substantial burden of Depression and thoughts ofself-harm. There are many similarities between the obtained results from this studyand other conducted studies. For example in one research suicidal thoughts andbehavior which is the extreme outcome of depression was commonly found amongyounger age group compared to the older. This is very similar to the results of thisstudy. Also, the most common method for committing suicide was hanging in thisstudy and others. Paying attention to high risk groups has to be properly establishedin order to minimize life threatening outcomes. The high risk groups are Pakistanees,those who has no regular annual vacation, the young, those with chronic diseases andworkers on medications. Researchers recommend to provide workers with regularannual vacation and good health care in order to minimize the rate of depression andsuicide. Anxiety rates can be reduced by getting middle aged population who can dealwith the different stressful life events.