Psychosocial research with children in Iraq: current health practice and policy in a context of armed conflict.

There is a need to show how psychosocial issues affect children in conflict areas like Iraq. Raising knowledge and awareness of children's mental health status in Iraq has been difficult and the knowledge base has been limited by the shortage of resources, international sanctions and the isolation of Iraqi scholars. Many obstacles to research in Iraq exist but an agenda should be developed emphasising the need for high-quality contextualised psychosocial research.

Iraqi children's rights: building a system under fire.

War violates every human right of children. In recent years, the lives of Iraqi children and the livelihoods of their families have become precarious. Conflict has split the communities where they live and taken the lives of hundreds of their friends and family members.

Follow-up studies on children with severe dietary chloride deficiency during infancy.

Ten children who had severe dietary chloride deficiency during early infancy have grown normally during their first 4 to 5 years. With the exception of one child who did not get into the sitting position alone until he was 9 1/2 months of age, the patients reached the usual developmental milestones of the first 2 years during the expected age intervals. Developmental and psychological testing indicates that all of the children have at least average ability.

School phobia: a therapeutic trial with clomipramine and short-term outcome.

A double-blind trial failed to demonstrate any significant short-term effects of clomipramine in doses recommended for use in general practice (in addition to the usual range of psychotherapeutic help) in the treatment of children with school refusal and neurotic disorder. Patterns of improvement were also studied for the sample as a whole irrespective of treatment. Neither age nor sex were significantly related to improvement, except on one behavioural measure where girls initially did better than boys.