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Review
. 2016 Sep 9:37:10.
doi: 10.1186/s40985-016-0024-5. eCollection 2016.

Refugee trauma measurement: a review of existing checklists

Erika Sigvardsdotter  1 , Andreas Malm  1   2   3 , Petter Tinghög  1   2 , Marjan Vaez  2 , Fredrik Saboonchi  1   2
Affiliations
Review

Refugee trauma measurement: a review of existing checklists

Erika Sigvardsdotter et al. Public Health Rev. .

Abstract

Abstract: Studies have shown that a high proportion of refugees have been subjected to potentially traumatic experiences (PTEs). PTEs, including torture, are powerful predictors of mental ill health. This paper reports a review of refugee trauma history self-report measures used in population studies.

Methods: A review of existing instruments and checklists, up to September 2015, was performed.

Results: The types of measures for refugee trauma history vary from semi-structured interviews and medical records to extensive multi-item trauma-checklists. The Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ) was the most commonly used instrument for measuring trauma history among refugee populations. Few checklists included PTEs during the flight.

Conclusion: Trauma history checklists are often used as a tool to control for background variables when studying refugees' mental health and have mostly been developed in clinical or semi-clinical settings. There is a need for acceptable, reliable and valid brief checklists for measuring trauma in refugees, for the purpose of performing larger scale population studies.

Keywords: Refugee trauma; Review; Review of trauma instruments; Trauma checklist.

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