2001/12/01 by Melissa Farley, Beatrice M. Patsalides · 2 citations
Psychology · #Child Abuse and Trauma #Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Research #Migration, Health and Trauma
paper · doi:10.2466/pr0.2001.89.3.595
openalex publication_date 2001/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/05/21
For four groups of women: no abuse, physical abuse alone, combined sexual and physical abuse, and unclear about memories of abuse, we examined the associations between childhood sexual and physical abuse, chronic physical symptoms in adulthood, PTSD, and health care utilization. Of a randomly selected sample of 600 adult femalc members of a health maintenance organization, 86 (14%) chose to participate. Women with a history of physical and sexual abuse in childhood reported significantly more cardiovascular, immune, musculoskeletal, neurologic, and reproductive symptoms than those without this history. While the Sexual/Physical Abuse group had the most chronic physical symptoms, medical visits, emergency room visits, prescriptions, and severe PTSD, the Unclear Memory group consistently ranked second on these same measures--higher than either Controls or the Physical Abuse group. Findings underscore the importance of screening for trauma history among patients seen in medical clinics, and the importance for psychotherapists of attending to patients' physical as well as psychological symptoms of childhood trauma.