More than 700,000 refugees from Southeast Asia have settled in the
United States since 1975. Although many have suffered serious trauma,
including torture, few clinical reports have described their trauma-
related symptoms and psychosocial problems. The authors conducted a
treatment study of 52 patients in a clinic for Indochinese. They found that
these patients were a highly traumatized group; each had experienced a mean
of 10 traumatic events and two torture experiences. Many of the patients
had concurrent diagnoses of major affective disorder and posttraumatic
stress disorder as well as medical and social disabilities associated with
their history of trauma. The authors also found that Cambodian women
without spouses demonstrated more serious psychiatric and social
impairments than all other Indochinese patient groups.
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