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On Intercountry Adoptions

To the Editor: The report of Wendy Tieman, M.S., and colleagues (1) on psychiatric disorders in intercountry adoptees was a useful review of the Netherlands experience. Although the authors found a higher risk of mental disorders in adoptees, they noted that "The majority did not show serious mental health problems," and they commented that "This is surprising, given the adverse circumstances in which the majority of these children lived the first part of their lives" (p. 597). Such comments are consistent with the findings from an Australian study of adolescents (mean age=15 years and 2 months) who had been adopted from Indonesia and who had no increase in psychiatric symptom profiles compared with a random community sample of similarly aged adolescents (2). Furthermore, there was no correlation between the measure of psychopathology and the age at which the adolescents had been adopted. Although the findings are unexpected, they may reflect the care with which intercountry adoptions are undertaken.

References

1. Tieman W, van der Ende J, Verhulst FC: Psychiatric disorders in young adult intercountry adoptees: an epidemiological study. Am J Psychiatry 2005; 162:592–598[Abstract/Free Full Text]
2. Goldney RD, Donald M, Sawyer MG, Kosky RJ, Priest S: Emotional health of Indonesian adoptees living in Australian families. Aust NZ J Psychiatry 1996; 30:534–539[Medline]

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