The Khmer Adolescent Project. I. Epidemiologic findings in two generations of Cambodian refugees

Abstract

A nonstratified random sample of 209 Khmer adolescents, ages 13 to 25, and a parent or guardian from two Western communities were interviewed to determine their diagnostic status following their survival of the Pol Pot War in Cambodia, from 1975 to 1979. Subjects were administered the posttraumatic stress disorder section of the Diagnostic Instrument for Children and Adolescents and selected sections of the Schedule of Affective Disorders and Schizophrenia for School-Age Children--Epidemiologic Version, with the assistance of a Cambodian translator. Roughly one fifth of the adolescents, over one half of the mothers, and about one third of the fathers qualified for a current diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder. There was high comorbidity with depression, but other forms of psychopathology were much less evident. The clinical importance of distinguishing prior trauma from other forms of cultural loss and resettlement stress is discussed.