Taking into account the familiar and personal history described one
could expect a low socioeconomic status, important social problems
and a high prevalence of psychiatric and substance abuse disorders in
these subjects. Nonetheless, in regard to socioeconomic development
we found an acceptable socioeconomic level, with 80% of the study
population classified as having a high or medium socioeconomic level
according the FAS test and a good educational level, while on the other
hand, the social problems seemed to be very high. A high percentage of
subjects had completed elementary school, and 50% of the subjects had
continued with further studies (the rate of subjects achieving university
or postgraduate studies was not analyzed since most of the subjects
had not reached the age to complete such studies). At the time of the
interview, 36.7% of the subjects reported being unemployed, which is
not surprising considering that in 2011 the unemployment rate among
young youths from 20 to 29 years of age in Spain reached 34.7% [20]
and that some of the subjects were still pursuing their studies.
One of the main points of interest was the development of psychiatric
disorders and their relationship with maternal opiate consumption.
According to ESEMeD-Spain (European Study of the Epidemiology of
Mental Disorders) [21] study, 19.5% of Spanish people over 18 years
old have a mental disorder during their lifetime. In the case of children
and teenagers the global prevalence of mental disorders in Spain is
estimated to be 10%-20% according to the different studies [22]. These
data contrast with ours, where up to 56.7% of the subjects had gone to
a psychiatrist in childhood, 26.7% of subject had received psychiatric
medical treatment and a 33.3% of the patients had been diagnosed with
some psychiatric disorder. The most frequent diagnoses in our sample
were depression and ADHD. In Spain, it is estimated that the longest
prevalence of depression represents a 2% in schoolchildren and up to
8% during the adolescence even when still being underdiagnosed [23].
In our sample we found 5 cases of depression diagnosed in childhood,
constituting a 16.7%, a higher percentage of those described in the
literature. Moreover, it has been found a significant relationship with
the antecedent of child abuse, being a risk factor for the development of