Psychiatric and somatic health in relation to experience of parental divorce in childhood.

BACKGROUND The outcome of studies about the experience of parental divorce and its effects on mental and physical health differs, a result possibly caused by the use of different questionnaires and instruments, varying length of time since the divorce and divergent drop-out of participants. AIMS To study the presence of psychiatric records and number of diagnosed somatic and mental healthcare visits in a group of young adults with childhood experience of parental divorce in comparison to a group without this experience. METHODS The presence of records at public psychiatric clinics and 10 years of administrative healthcare data (somatic and mental) were checked for both groups. RESULTS Significantly more persons from the divorce group appeared in child and adolescent psychiatric care; this was most pronounced in females. However, there were no significant differences between the groups in the number of persons seeking adult psychiatry or in the number of psychiatric consultations. Experience of parental divorce was not found to be an indicator of larger somatic health problems. CONCLUSION Experience of parental divorce in childhood is not an indicator of adult psychiatric or somatic need of care.