Methods of internet addiction screening for teens and young adults in Primary Care

Introduction: Considering the generalized Internet access as well as the electronic communication, teens and young adults are at risk for a new type of dependency, the Internet addiction, with a high impact on the personal and professional life, as well as on the school performance. Objective: The current paper aims to introduce in the clinical practice a validated diagnosis tool for this new condition, allowing the proper identification of the problem cases for counselling and specific approach by the Family Physician and the Child Psychiatrist. Method: The IAT (Internet Addiction Test), created by Kimberly Young, was selected and applied on two small groups of patients from a Family Medicine practice (Group A) and a Child Psychiatry practice (Group B) from an urban setting, city of Iași. Results: Accordingly to the test standard interpretation, the patients have been divided in: average user (20 49p) 28 cases (70%), occasional or frequent problem presenting user (50 79p) 11 cases (27,5%), significant problem presenting user (80 100p) 1 case (2,5%). The group of patients presenting to the Child Psychiatry practice for other issues had a higher incidence of Internet addiction problems. Conclusions: The Family Physician must screen for Internetassociated problems to discover early stage excessive users. The validated screening tools are useful in the current practice and the specialty counselling is extremely important for this specific population.