title: Epidemiologic and phenomenological aspects of post-traumatic stress disorder: DSM-III-R diagnosis and diagnostic criteria not validated.
abstract: The aim of this cohort study was: (i) to validate the diagnostic criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) of the DSM-III-R; and (ii) to examine the incidence rate of PTSD in a study population exposed to two different traumatic events, i.e. a fire in a hotel ball-room and a multiple collision car-crash on a Belgian highway. One hundred and eighty-five victims (130 fire and 55 car accident victims) were assessed between 7 and 9 months after the traumatic event using the Composite International Diagnostic Interview (CIDI), PTSD Module, a fully structured diagnostic interview for the assessment of PTSD according to DSM-III-R criteria. Twenty-three percent of the study population met DSM-III-R criteria for PTSD. By means of unsupervised and supervised multivariate statistical analyses we were unable to validate the three-factorial structure, i.e. criteria B, C and D, of the DSM-III-R PTSD diagnosis. The latter relies heavily on the C diagnostic criteria, which appear to be too restrictive. Women were more likely to develop symptoms of reexperience (B) and arousal (D) than men. There was a significantly higher incidence of criteria B, C and D, but not of PTSD, in fire than in car-accident victims. Between 42 and 57% of the victims developed the first PTSD symptoms on the day of the trauma; within the next week these incidence rates increased to 77.1, 57.8 and 73.5% for criteria B, C and D, respectively. In conclusion, this study was unable to demonstrate the validity of the diagnostic criteria for PTSD according to DSM-III-R. The present cohort study has defined a number of factors that may predict new occurrences of PTSD symptoms after a traumatic event, i.e. gender, type of trauma and time delay between the trauma and the assessment of the diagnostic criteria.
authors.affiliation: Clinical Research Center for Mental Health, University Department of Psychiatry, AZ Stuivenberg, Antwerpen, Belgium. m.maes@unicall.be
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Maes
authors.forename: L
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Delmeire
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Schotte
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Janca
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Creten
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mylle
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Struyf
authors.forename: G
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Pison
authors.forename: P J
authors.initials: PJ
authors.lastname: Rousseeuw
mesh_terms: D000063:Accidents, Traffic / Q000523:psychology; D000328:Adult; D000368:Aged; D001530:Belgium / Q000453:epidemiology; D015331:Cohort Studies; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D005390:Fires; D006801:Humans; D015994:Incidence; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011569:Psychiatric Status Rating Scales / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*; D011594:Psychometrics; D015203:Reproducibility of Results; D013313:Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic / Q000145:classification / Q000175:diagnosis* / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology