RT Journal Article
SR Electronic
T1 Pediatric PTSD: Clinical, Forensic, and Diagnostic Understanding
JF Journal of the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law Online
JO J Am Acad Psychiatry Law
FD American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law
SP 161
OP 169
VO 45
IS 2
A1 Frank K. Tedeschi
A1 Stephen B. Billick
YR 2017
UL http://jaapl.org/content/45/2/161.abstract
AB Exposure to trauma is a common event in the lives of children and adolescents living in the United States. Although a minority of youth develop full posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after a traumatic event, those who do tend to have an extended course of symptoms in multiple functional domains and higher rates of psychiatric comorbidities. Pediatric PTSD can play an important role in legal settings, and requires that an expert witness be well versed in advances in clinical and conceptual models of this diagnosis and familiar with current research devoted to the posttraumatic response in youth. This review is designed to be a resource for the forensic evaluator and outlines the current understanding of epidemiological and clinical features of pediatric PTSD, as well as the neurobiological, dimensional, and developmental conceptual models that describe it.