Chronic kidney disease (CKD) is a potentially life-threatening condition leading to various psychosocial problems associated with different treatment modalities in addition to their medical advantages and disadvantages. The aim of this study was to evaluate the psychiatric morbidity in children with CKD in terms of different treatment modalities in comparison to healthy peers. In addition, parental attitudes and psychiatric symptoms in this group of mothers were examined.

A matched cohort study including 66 children with CKD (21 renal transplantation, 27 dialysis, 18 conservative treatment) and 37 healthy age- and sex-matched controls were evaluated. Children filled out the Children's Depression Inventory, the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory, and the Parental Attitude Scale, and the mothers filled out the Symptom Checklist-90-R. The Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School-Age Children, Present and Lifetime Version was used for psychiatric diagnosis.

The overall depression scores in children and the mothers’ overall symptom severity index were significantly higher in the CKD group: 40.9% of children in the CKD group were diagnosed with a psychiatric disorder, while the corresponding figure for the control group was 16.2%. The in-group comparison of the CKD group failed to detect any significant difference between the three treatment modalities.

The results support the findings of research showing that CKD has high psychiatric morbidity. It is important to include psychosocial and psychiatric assessments in the evaluation processes of different treatment modalities in CKD.