HEALTH3.B Emotional and behavioral difficulties: Percentage of children ages 4–17 whose parent had contact with a health care provider or school staff, who were prescribed medication, or who received treatment other than medication by level of emotional and behavioral difficulty, 2007

HEALTH3.B Emotional and behavioral difficulties: Percentage of children ages 4–17 whose parent had contact^a with a health care provider or school staff, who were prescribed medication, or who received treatment other than medication by level of emotional and behavioral difficulty, 2007

	Contact with health care provider or school staff	Prescribed medication^b	Treatment^b other than medication
Level of difficulty
Serious difficulties	85.5	46.1	50.5
Minor difficulties	51.0	14.4	16.4
No difficulties	3.6	1.0	1.0
^a Data on service contact and type of service for an emotional or behavioral difficulty are from new service questions added in 2005 and asked directly after the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire. A child who had more than one type of service or contact was included in more than one column.
^b Prescribed medication or treatment for emotional or behavioral difficulties.
NOTE: Emotional or behavioral difficulties of children were based on parental responses to the following question on the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ):¹ "Overall, do you think that (child) has any difficulties in one or more of the following areas: emotions, concentration, behavior, or being able to get along with other people?" Response choices were: (1) no; (2) yes, minor difficulties; (3) yes, definite difficulties; and (4) yes, severe difficulties. Children with serious emotional or behavioral difficulties are defined as those whose parent responded "yes, definite" or "yes, severe." These difficulties may be similar to but do not equate with the Federal definition of serious emotional disturbances (SED), used by the Federal government for planning purposes.
SOURCE: National Center for Health Statistics, National Health Interview Survey.
¹ Goodman, R. (1999). The extended version of the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire as a guide to child psychiatric caseness and consequent burden. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 40, 791–799.

HEALTH3.B Emotional and behavioral difficulties: Percentage of children ages 4–17 whose parent had contacta with a health care provider or school staff, who were prescribed medication, or who received treatment other than medication by level of emotional and behavioral difficulty, 2007

HEALTH3.B Emotional and behavioral difficulties: Percentage of children ages 4–17 whose parent had contact^a with a health care provider or school staff, who were prescribed medication, or who received treatment other than medication by level of emotional and behavioral difficulty, 2007