Psychological well-being and chronic condition in portuguese adolescents

© 2015 The Author(s). Published by Taylor & Francis. This is an OpenAccess article distributed under the terms of theCreative CommonsAttribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the originalwork is properly cited. The moral rights of the named author(s) have been asserted.Objective: To examine the differences in the psychological well-being of Portuguese adolescents' (1) living with a chronic condition (CC) and (2) living with a CC and feeling it affects/not affects school participation. Methods: There were 5050 Portuguese adolescents as participants of the Health Behaviour in School-aged Children/WHO. Results: Adolescents without CC often feel rarely or never ‘sad/depressed’, ‘irritated/bad humour’, ‘nervous’, ‘fearful’ or ‘so sad that it seems I can't take it’, compared with their healthy peers. Young people living with CC and feeling that it does not affect participation in school, often feel rarely or never ‘sad/depressed’, ‘fearful’ or ‘so sad that it seems I can't take it’, comparing with the ones with CC and feeling it affects school. All of these symptoms were higher in adolescents living with a CC. Conclusions: Adolescents living with a CC and feeling that it affects participation in school can be at a higher risk for a healthy psychological well-being. Future early interventions based on a ‘health assets’ approach should be implemented.This work (HBSC/WHO in Portugal) was supported by “Aventura Social” team members on data collection/management and was co-financed by Alto Comissariado da Saúde, Ministério da Saúde (High Commission for Health, Health Ministry) and Coordenação Nacional para a Infecção VIH/SIDA (National Coordination for HIV/AIDS). Santos, T. receives a PhD grant from the Portuguese Foundation for Science and Technology (FCT),reference SFRH/BD/82066/2011. None of the authors reported any further financial interests or potential conflicts of interest.