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Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence

BACKGROUND: Alexithymia has been related to adult health care use. We investigated the association between alexithymia and the utilization of primary health care services by adolescents and young adults. METHODS: The participants (n = 751, aged 13–18 years) in this 5-year follow-up study were assess...

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Autores principales: Kekkonen, Virve, Kraav, Siiri-Liisi, Hintikka, Jukka, Kivimäki, Petri, Kaarre, Outi, Tolmunen, Tommi
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Oxford University Press 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10234664/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36977353
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckad041
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author Kekkonen, Virve
Kraav, Siiri-Liisi
Hintikka, Jukka
Kivimäki, Petri
Kaarre, Outi
Tolmunen, Tommi
author_facet Kekkonen, Virve
Kraav, Siiri-Liisi
Hintikka, Jukka
Kivimäki, Petri
Kaarre, Outi
Tolmunen, Tommi
author_sort Kekkonen, Virve
collection PubMed
description BACKGROUND: Alexithymia has been related to adult health care use. We investigated the association between alexithymia and the utilization of primary health care services by adolescents and young adults. METHODS: The participants (n = 751, aged 13–18 years) in this 5-year follow-up study were assessed with the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and its three subscales, difficulty identifying feelings (DIF), difficulty describing feelings (DDF) and externally oriented thinking (EOT), and the 21-item Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Primary health care data were gathered from health care centre registers in 2005–10. Generalized linear models and mediation analyses were used. RESULTS: An increase in the TAS-20 total score correlated with a higher number of primary health care and emergency care visits, but in multivariate general linear models, TAS-20 total scores were no longer significant. Younger age, female gender and an increase in the baseline EOT score are associated with a higher number of both primary health care and emergency room visits. In females, a smaller change in the EOT score from baseline to follow-up was associated with a higher number of primary health care visits. In mediation analyses, EOT had a direct effect on a higher number of primary health care and emergency room visits, whereas the BDI score mediated the incremental effect of DIF and DDF on visit numbers. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that an EOT style independently increases health care use by adolescents, whereas the effects of difficulties identifying and describing feelings on health care use are mediated by symptoms of depression.
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spelling pubmed-102346642023-06-02 Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence Kekkonen, Virve Kraav, Siiri-Liisi Hintikka, Jukka Kivimäki, Petri Kaarre, Outi Tolmunen, Tommi Eur J Public Health Mental Health BACKGROUND: Alexithymia has been related to adult health care use. We investigated the association between alexithymia and the utilization of primary health care services by adolescents and young adults. METHODS: The participants (n = 751, aged 13–18 years) in this 5-year follow-up study were assessed with the 20-item Toronto Alexithymia Scale (TAS-20) and its three subscales, difficulty identifying feelings (DIF), difficulty describing feelings (DDF) and externally oriented thinking (EOT), and the 21-item Beck Depression Inventory (BDI). Primary health care data were gathered from health care centre registers in 2005–10. Generalized linear models and mediation analyses were used. RESULTS: An increase in the TAS-20 total score correlated with a higher number of primary health care and emergency care visits, but in multivariate general linear models, TAS-20 total scores were no longer significant. Younger age, female gender and an increase in the baseline EOT score are associated with a higher number of both primary health care and emergency room visits. In females, a smaller change in the EOT score from baseline to follow-up was associated with a higher number of primary health care visits. In mediation analyses, EOT had a direct effect on a higher number of primary health care and emergency room visits, whereas the BDI score mediated the incremental effect of DIF and DDF on visit numbers. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that an EOT style independently increases health care use by adolescents, whereas the effects of difficulties identifying and describing feelings on health care use are mediated by symptoms of depression. Oxford University Press 2023-03-28 /pmc/articles/PMC10234664/ /pubmed/36977353 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckad041 Text en © The Author(s) 2023. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the European Public Health Association. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Mental Health
Kekkonen, Virve
Kraav, Siiri-Liisi
Hintikka, Jukka
Kivimäki, Petri
Kaarre, Outi
Tolmunen, Tommi
Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title_full Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title_fullStr Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title_full_unstemmed Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title_short Externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
title_sort externally oriented thinking style increases primary health care use in adolescence
topic Mental Health
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10234664/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/36977353
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/eurpub/ckad041
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