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Abstract
Background
Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) can be a debilitating disorder and often co-occurs with other psychiatric disorders, such as mood, behavioral, and anxiety disorders. Early identification of PTSD and psychiatric comorbidity is highly relevant in order to offer children appropriate and timely treatment. The Children's Revised Impact of Event Scale (CRIES-13) is a reliable and valid self-report measure designed to screen children for PTSD. However, this measure is not useful as a screen for psychiatric comorbidity in children with probable PTSD.
Objective
This study evaluated the screening accuracy of the CRIES-Plus, that is, the CRIES-13 combined with 12 additional items to detect psychiatric comorbidity.
Method
The CRIES-Plus was completed by 398 Dutch children (7–18 years) exposed to various traumatic events. Psychiatric diagnoses were assessed using the Anxiety Disorders Interview Schedule for DSM-IV: Child version.
Results
Six additional items were significantly associated with mood disorders, three items were associated with behavioral disorders, and five items with anxiety disorders. Additional items associated with mood and anxiety disorders demonstrated good discriminatory ability, with cut-off scores of ≥14 and ≥10, respectively. Items associated with behavioral disorders had poor to fair discriminatory ability, with no clear cut-off point.
Conclusions
Our findings support the use of the CRIES-Plus to screen for PTSD and comorbid disorders which may help clinicians in assigning appropriate follow-up diagnostic and clinical care.
For the abstract or full text in other languages, please see Supplementary files under ‘Article Tools’
For the abstract or full text in other languages, please see Supplementary files under ‘Article Tools’
Acknowledgements
The authors thank Joost Daams, clinical librarian from the Division of Clinical Methods and Public Health, Academic Medical Center, Amsterdam, the Netherlands, for his help with the literature search. The authors thank Alexandra De Young, research fellow at University of Queensland, Australia, for her help as a native English speaker. Finally, the authors also thank Annu Sharma, Romana Luske, Sanja Goddijn, Mirjam Schippers, and Maj Gigengack who have done an excellent job in the collection of data.
Notes
For the abstract or full text in other languages, please see Supplementary files under ‘Article Tools’