Screening for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder in Young Children Following Hospitalisation for Injury Using the Pediatric Emotional Distress Scale Early Screener

Screening for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among children hospitalised for injury is vital in ensuring that children at risk of experiencing persistent symptoms are identified for referral to intervention. Currently there is a paucity of research investigating screening among children under the age of 6 years, with only one screening tool specifically designed for use with this population: the Pediatric Emotional Distress Scale Early Screener (PEDS-ES). The current study aimed, firstly, to investigate the impact of the timing of screening on the predictive performance of the PEDS-ES and, secondly to further validate the PEDS-ES by examining its predictive performance among 1 to 2 year old and 3 to 6 year old children. Based on trajectory analyses it was expected that the predictive performance of the PEDS-ES would increase as the time between injury and screening increased. Furthermore, it was expected that the measure would display greater predictive performance among the 3 to 6 year old children than among the 1 to 2 year old children. The sample consisted of 98 caregivers of children between the ages of 1 and 6 years that presented with a burn or other injury to the Royal Children’s Hospital (RCH) in Brisbane, Australia. Caregivers completed the PEDS-ES within 2 weeks of the child’s injury and were followed up at 6 months post-injury with a PTSD diagnostic interview. Analyses of the predictive performance of the PEDS-ES when administered within 72 hours, at 1week and 2 weeks post-injury revealed that the measure performed better than chance at predicting PTSD only when administered at 2 weeks following injury. Additionally, a cut-off of 13 maximised sensitivity (100%) and specificity (100%). Furthermore, results supported the validity of the PEDS-ES at predicting PTSD among both the 1 to 2 year old and 3 to 6 year old children. Based on these results, it was recommended that hospitals implement screening at 2 weeks post-injury and utilise the PEDS-ES for screening all children between the ages of 1 and 6 years