Prevalence and Predictors of Suicidal Ideation in Patients Following Cardiac Surgery (original) (raw)

2022, World Journal of Surgery

More than one billion children are estimated to be growing up on urban streets around the world, and these numbers are most likely to increase as the global population and urbanization continues apace (UNICEF, 2012). There are concerns in Ghana that the high number of street children and adolescents could become a public health issue. For example, the prevalence of the phenomenon has increased from about 35 000 to 90 000 within the last five years in Accra alone (Accra Metropolitan Assembly, 2014). A headcount conducted in 2009 indicated that there are about 35 000 or more street children in the Greater Accra region alone (The Catholic Action for Street Children, 2010). In 2011, key child labour indicators from the Ministry of Women and Children Affairs indicated that over 50 000 children were living and working on the streets with nearly 50% in the Greater Accra region alone (Ministry of Women and Children Affairs, 2012). These street children, found predominantly in regional capitals of Southern Ghana, work mainly as porters, sales workers, and sometimes as commercial child sex workers (Anarfi, 1997; Oduro, 2012). Life for youth on the street influences their behaviours directed at survival and coping with being 'homeless', while the interplay between these factors determines their psychological functioning. Their health vulnerability is further compounded by a lack of HIV education as well as sexual and reproductive health education for adolescents, as these mostly occur within the school context (Awusabo-Asare et al., 2006). Few activities are directed at marginalised, out-of-school youth, including homeless youth. It is thus not surprising that homeless youth have a prevalence of mental illness twice as high as youth in the general population (UNICEF, 2012; Whitbeck, 2009). Suicide, a