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Childhood Trauma If a child has experienced a traumatic event, he or she should be presented for an assessment and evaluation as soon as possible. A child's development, both physical and cognitive, may be impacted as well as their self-concepts. This can impact future development and relationship skills depending on the extent and duration of the trauma, the age that trauma occurs, family, social and community support for the child, legal involvement and the child's relationship to the perpetrator (if any) of the trauma. Art and expressive therapies work best when treating children due to limitations in their language and cognitive development. Children process and resolve trauma through play and art. For more information on childhood trauma visit the following: National Institute of Mental Health Royal College of Psychiatrists SAMHSA NAMI (National Alliance on Mental Illness) Yahoo! Health
| Identification and Treatment of Childhood Trauma
| Traumatic Events and Trauma There are many factors that come into play as to how a child or adult will react to and be impacted by traumatic events.There is also abundant literature on preventing trauma disorders after experiencing the traumatic event. Traumatic Event - Defined The DSM-IV-TRtr (Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition, Text Revision, American Psychiatric Association, 2000) defines a traumatic event as follows: "The person has been exposed to a traumatic event in which both of the following were present: the person experienced, witnessed, or was confronted with an event or events that involved actual or threateded death or serious injury, or a threat to the physical integrity of self or others - the person's response involved intense fear, helplessness, or horror. Note: in children, this may be expressed instead by disorganized or agitated behavior.
Symptoms of Trauma (DSM-IV-TRTR) The traumatic event is persistently reexperienced in one or more of the following ways:
Recurrent and intrusive recollections of the event, including images, thoughts or perceptions. Young children may engage in repetitive play in which themes of the trauma are expressed. Recurrent dreams of the event. Children may have frightening dreams without recognizable content. Acting or feeling as if the traumatic event were recurring (includes a sense of reliving the experience, illusions, hallucinations, and dissociative flashbacks, including when awake or intoxicated. Young children may reenact trauma-specific events. Intense psychological distress at exposure to internal or external cues that symbolize or resemble as aspect of the traumatic event. Physiological reactivity on exposure to internal or external cues that symbolize or resemble as aspect of the traumatic event.
2. Persistent avoidance of stimuli associated with the trauma and numbing of general responsiveness (not present before trauma), as indicated by three or more of the following: Efforts to avoid thoughts, feelings, or conversations associated with the trauma. Efforts to avoid activities, places, or people that arouse recollections of the trauma. Markedly diminished interest or participation in significant activities. - Feeling of detachment or estrangement from others.
Restricted range of affect (e.g., unable to have loving feelings). Sense of a foreshortened future (e.g., does not expect to have a career, marriage, children, or a normal life span).
3. Persistent symptoms of increased arousal (not present before the trauma), as indicated by two or more of the following: Difficulty falling or staying asleep. Irritability or outbursts of anger. Difficulty concentrating. Hypervigilance. Exaggerated startle response.
Diagnosis of a stress disorder is contigent upon the duration of the above symptoms and whether the symptoms cause clinically significant distress or impairment in social, occupational, or other important areas of functioning. Acust Stress Disorder is indicated when the disturbance lasts for a minimum of 2 days and a maximum of 4 weeks and occurs within 4 weeks of the traumatic event. PTSD (Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is indicated when the disturbance is more than 1 month.
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