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Background: Depression among adolescents has been recognized as a public health problem all over the world. In Nigeria, as in most developing countries, there is a need for more research on the epidemiology of adolescent depression as this will guide prevention, diagnosis and treatment. Objectives: The study sought to determine the one month prevalence and predictors of depression among a sample of in-school adolescents in a rural region in South West Nigeria. Materials and Methods: This was a cross sectional descriptive survey among 540 secondary school students randomly selected from the six secondary schools in the study area using a Socio demographic Questionnaire and the Patient Health Questionnaire modified for Adolescents. Subsequently, a proportion of them were interviewed with the Kiddies Schedule for Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia. Results: Data were analyzed using the SPSS version 17. Respondents were aged 10 - 19 years (mean age was 14.07 ± 1.84). The one month prevalence of depression among the study population was 16.3% (using weighting method). Logistic regression analysis showed that death of a mother (OR = 11.786, 95% CI, 1.990 - 23.184), being from a polygamous family (OR = 5.781, 95% CI, 3.253 - 24.371), low socioeconomic class (OR = 6.222, 95% CI, 4.705 - 23.379), having a single parent (OR = 2.236, 95% CI, 0.869 - 11.786), having witnessed frequent violence (OR = 12.411, 95% CI, 0.516 - 29.851) and positive history of sexual abuse (OR = 0.203, 95% CI, 0.003 - 0.529) were significantly and independently associated with depression in this sample of adolescents. Conclusion: The one month prevalence of adolescent depression within the study population is slightly higher than what has been reported in other parts of the world. Therefore, there is a need for government to design and implement policies which can help to prevent, detect early, and treat depression among youths especially in rural areas.

Background: The use of psychoactive substances is a major global public health problem and is associated with psychosocial, economic and mental health consequences. The occurrence of co-morbidity with substance use disorders has been shown to make diagnosis of either condition problematic, worsen prognosis, linked with poorer compliance to treatment and associated with an overall increase in morbidity and mortality. Not much is known about the pattern of substance use and accompanying co morbidity in this geopolitical zone of the country, hence this study. Aims and objectives: The study aimed to evaluate the co morbidity and associated clinico-demographic characteristics of patients diagnosed with substance use disorder (dependence syndrome) in a tertiary health institution in Damaturu, North East Nigeria. Methods: We conducted a retrospective review between May 2017 and April 2019 of case notes of patients and extracted socio demographic, clinical and drug related data from their clinical records. The study participants consisted of eighty eight (88) patients and the participants included in the study met ICD-10 diagnostic criteria of dependence syndrome. Data analyses were done using Statistical Package for Social Sciences version 21. Results: Majority of the respondents were male 85/88 (96.6%), adolescents and young adults 65/88 (73.9%), had friends using substances 82/88 (93.2%), were daily multiple times user 61/88 (69.3%) and had previous history of substance use 74/88 (84.1). Indian hemp is the most widely used substance among the participants and almost half of the participants 36/88 (40.9%) reported “feeling high” as the reason for substance use. Depression was the commonest psychiatric co morbidity among the substance users 43/88 (48.9%), followed by bipolar disorders 14/88 (15.9%) and schizophrenia 11/88 (12.5%). Peer pressure influence, co morbidity and reason for substance use were significantly associated with substance use. Conclusion: The findings in this study suggest the need for psycho educational programmes that will target young adults and adolescents who have increased propensity to use substances. Continuous research in substance use disorders will also help in monitoring trends and formulating adequate strategies for control of substance use.