PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Amala Someshwar
AU  - Bharath Holla
AU  - Preeti Pansari Agarwal
AU  - Anza Thomas
AU  - Anand Jose
AU  - Bobin Joseph
AU  - Birudu Raju
AU  - Hariprasad Karle
AU  - M Muthukumaran
AU  - Prabhath G Kodancha
AU  - Pramod Kumar
AU  - Preethi V Reddy
AU  - Ravi Kumar Nadella
AU  - Sanjay T Naik
AU  - Sayantanava Mitra
AU  - Sreenivasulu Mallappagiri
AU  - Vanteemar S Sreeraj
AU  - Srinivas Balachander
AU  - Suhas Ganesh
AU  - Pratima Murthy
AU  - Vivek Benegal
AU  - Janardhan Y. C. Reddy
AU  - Sanjeev Jain
AU  - Jayant Mahadevan
AU  - Biju Viswanath
TI  - Adverse childhood experiences in families with multiple members diagnosed to have psychiatric illnesses
AID  - 10.1101/745521
DP  - 2019 Jan 01
TA  - bioRxiv
PG  - 745521
4099  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/08/30/745521.short
4100  - http://biorxiv.org/content/early/2019/08/30/745521.full
AB  - Objective Adverse Childhood Experiences (ACEs) are linked to the development of a number of psychiatric illnesses in adulthood. Our study examined the pattern of ACEs and their relation to the age of onset (AAO) of major psychiatric conditions in individuals from families that had ≥ 2 first degree relatives with major psychiatric conditions (multiplex families) identified as part of an ongoing longitudinal study.Methods Our sample consisted of 509 individuals from 215 families. Of these, 268 were affected i.e diagnosed with bipolar disorder (BPAD) (n=61), obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD) (n=58), schizophrenia (n=52), substance dependence (SUD) (n=59), or co-occurring diagnoses (n=38); while 241 were at-risk first degree relatives (FDRs) who were either unaffected (n=210) or had other depressive or anxiety disorders (n=31). All individuals were evaluated using the Adverse Childhood Experiences – International Questionnaire (ACE-IQ) and ACE binary and frequency scores were calculated.Results It was seen that affected males, as a group, had the greatest ACE scores in our sample. A cox mixed-effects model fit by gender revealed that higher ACE binary and frequency scores were associated with significantly increased risk for an earlier AAO of psychiatric diagnoses in males. A similar model that evaluated the effect of diagnosis revealed an earlier AAO in OCD and SUD, but not in schizophrenia and BPAD.Conclusions Our study indicates that ACEs brought forward the onset of major psychiatric conditions in men and in individuals diagnosed with OCD and SUD. Ongoing longitudinal assessments in FDRs from these families are expected to identify mechanisms underlying this relationship.