Depression among Armed Police Force Soldiers Serving in a Police Headquarter: A Descriptive Cross-sectional Study

Authors

  • Nidesh Sapkota Department of Psychiatry, Patan Academy of Health Sciences, Lagankhel, Lalitpur, Nepal
  • Atit Tiwari Department of Psychiatry, BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, Dharan, Sunsari, Nepal
  • Mandeep Kunwar Department of Psychiatry, BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, Dharan, Sunsari, Nepal
  • Nisha Manandhar Department of Community Medicine and Tropical Diseases, BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, Dharan, Sunsari, Nepal
  • Bharat Khatri Sukraraj Tropical and Infectious Disease Hospital, Teku, Kathmandu, Nepal

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.31729/jnma.7497

Keywords:

armed forces personnel; depression; depressive symptoms; soldiers.

Abstract

Introduction: Depression is a common mental health problem among soldiers worldwide. Depression decreases the efficiency and productivity of the soldiers. The objective of this research is to find out the prevalence of depression among armed police force soldiers serving in a police headquarter.

Methods: A descriptive cross-sectional study was done on a total of 314 soldiers serving in the eastern regional armed police force headquarters of Nepal from January 15, 2017 to June 14, 2017 after receiving ethical clearance was taken from the Institutional Review Committee (Reference number: 140/073/074-IRC). Convenience sampling was done. Beck Depression Inventory was used to assess the prevalence of depression. Data were collected and entered in the Statistical Package for the Social Science version 15.0. which was used for data analysis. Point estimate at 95% Confidence Interval was calculated along with frequency and percentage for binary data.

Results: Among 314 soldiers, 133 (42.36%) (36.89-47.83 at a 95% Confidence Interval) soldiers had depression where, 47 (14.97%) had mild mood disturbance, 33 (10.51%) had borderline depression, 40 (12.74%) had moderate depression, 10 (3.18%) had severe depression and 3 (0.96%) had extreme depression.

Conclusions: The prevalence of depression in our study was lower when compared to other studies conducted in similar settings.

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Published

2022-05-05

How to Cite

Sapkota, N., Tiwari, A., Kunwar, M. ., Manandhar , N. ., & Khatri , B. . (2022). Depression among Armed Police Force Soldiers Serving in a Police Headquarter: A Descriptive Cross-sectional Study. Journal of Nepal Medical Association, 60(249), 457–460. https://doi.org/10.31729/jnma.7497

Issue

Vol. 60 No. 249 (2022): JNMA: Published Monthly

Section

Original Article

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Copyright (c) 2022 Nidesh Sapkota, Dr Atit Tiwari, Dr Mandeep Kunwar, Dr Nisha Manandhar , Dr Bharat Khatri

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