Citation

Mbwayo AW, Mathai M, Harder VS, Nicodimos S, Vander Stoep A. J. Child Adolesc. Trauma 2020; 13(1): 63-73.

Affiliation

4Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and Department of Epidemiology, University of Washington, Box 354920, Seattle, WA 98195 USA.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2020, Holtzbrinck Springer Nature Publishing Group)

DOI

10.1007/s40653-019-00256-2

PMID

32318229

PMCID

PMC7163810

Abstract

This study estimated the prevalence and correlates of PTSD in Kenyan school children during a period of widespread post-election violence. The UCLA PTSD Reaction Index was administered to 2482 primary and secondary school students ages 11-17 from rural and urban communities. A high proportion of school children had witnessed people being shot at, beat up or killed (46.9%) or had heard about the violent death or serious injury of a loved one (42.0%). Over one quarter (26.8%, 95% CI = 25.1% - 28.7%) met criteria for PTSD. Correlates of PTSD included living in a rural (vs urban) area (AOR = 1.72, 95% CI = 1.41-2.11), attending primary (vs secondary) school (AOR = 2.25, 95% CI = 1.67-3.04) and being a girl (with girl as referent AOR = .70, 95% CI = .57-.86). We recommend training Kenyan teachers to recognize signs of emotional distress in school children and psychosocial counselors to adapt empirically-supported mental health interventions for delivery in primary and secondary school settings.

© Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2019.

Language: en

Keywords

Adolescents; Children; Community violence; Kenya; PTSD prevalence; Trauma exposure