Screening of Acute Traumatic Stress Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Pediatric Trauma Patients: A Pilot Study

Abstract

In this pilot study, we sought to determine the utility of the 3 commonly used screening instruments for measuring traumatic stress symptoms in pediatric trauma patients to predict the diagnosis of acute stress disorder or PTSD. Limitations include the use of the Child Report of Post-Traumatic Symptoms screening tool as the gold standard for calculating test characteristics and lack of 24/7 enrollment capabilities. As such, a significant portion of patients were discharged prior to our teams' engagement for enrollment.