Predicting posttraumatic stress symptoms in children after road traffic accidents.

Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, December, 2005 by Landolt, Markus A.; Vollrath, Margarete; Timm, Karin; Gnehm, Hanspeter E.; Sennhauser, Felix H.

In Western societies, road traffic accidents (RTAs) are among the most common traumatic events that children can face. There is now considerable evidence that children can suffer significant and long-lasting psychological distress following everyday RTAs. Notably, previous studies found that about 10% to 35% of traffic-injured children develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or suffer from clinically relevant posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSSs; de Vries et al., 1999; Di Gallo et al., 1997; Ellis et al., 1998; Landolt et al., 2003; McDermott and Cvitanovich, 2000; Mirza et ...