Screening Instrument of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder for Children and Adolescents 7 – 15 Years of Age

The objective of this paper is to develop a brief screening instrument of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) for young victims of natural disasters. Data were derived from flood victims in 1998 and 1999 in Hunan, China. A representative population sample of 6,852 subjects 7–15 years of age was selected. Among them, 6,073 (88.6%) were interviewed. Multistage sampling was used to select the subjects and PTSD was ascertained with Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders: 4th Edition (DSM-IV). We randomly assigned 80% (4,851) of the study subjects to construct the screening instrument (construct model) and the remaining 20% (1,222) subjects to examine the model (validation model). Logistic regression analysis and receiver operating characteristics curves were utilized to select a subset of symptoms and cutoff point from the prestructured questionnaires. A seven-symptom instrument for PTSD screening was selected. Scores of 3 or more on this instrument were employed to define positive cases of PTSD with a sensitivity of 96.9%, specificity 99.0%, positive predictive value (PPV) 82.6%, and AiZhongLiu (&) H. Tan J. Zhou S. Li T. Yang Z. Sun S. W. Wen Department of Epidemiology & Health Statistics, School of Public Health, Central South University, Xiangya Road 110, Changsha, Hunan 410078, P. R. China e-mail: Liu_aizhong@hotmail.com AiZhongLiu T. Yang S. W. Wen OMNI Research Group, Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, 501 Smyth Rd, Ottawa, Canada K1H 8L6 AiZhongLiu T. Yang S. W. Wen Ottawa Health Research Institute, Clinical Epidemiology Program, University of Ottawa, 501 Smyth Rd, Ottawa, Canada K1H 8L6 S. W. Wen Department of Epidemiology and Community Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, 501 Smyth Rd, Ottawa, Canada K1H 8L6 Present Address: AiZhongLiu Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, 501 Smyth Rd, Box 241, Ottawa, ON, Canada K1H 8L6 123 Child Psychiatry Hum Dev (2007) 38:195–202 DOI 10.1007/s10578-007-0056-7

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