Psychological trauma and help seeking behaviour amongst resettled Iraqi refugees in attending English tuition classes in Australia

International Journal of Mental Health Systems

Anthony Francis Jorm³  Diana Milosevic²  Mitchell Smith⁶  Hanan Dover⁴  Yaser Mohammad⁴  Maral Melkonian⁴  Elise Bussion⁴  Jonathan M Mond⁵  Shameran Slewa-Younan¹ 

[1] Mental Health, School of Medicine, The University of Western Sydney, Locked Bag 1797, Penrith South DC, NSW, Australia;South Western Sydney Local Health District Eastern Campus, Liverpool Hospital, Sydney, Australia;Centre for Mental Health, Melbourne School of Population and Global Health, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia;Mental Health, School of Medicine, The University of Western Sydney, Sydney, Australia;Department of Psychology, Macquarie University, Sydney, Australia;New South Wales Refugee Health Service, Liverpool, UK

关键词: Resettlement;    Mental health;    Psychological distress;    Posttraumatic stress disorder;    Trauma;    Refugees;   

Others  :  1133598
DOI  :  10.1186/1752-4458-9-5

 received in 2014-07-21, accepted in 2015-01-12,  发布年份 2015

【 摘 要 】

Background

To examine levels of psychological distress and help seeking behaviour in resettled refugees attending English tuition classes in Australia, and their associations with participants’ demographic characteristics.

Methods

Data was collected by bilingual interviewers between March and November 2013. A volunteer sample of attendees of Adult Migrant English Programs (AMEP) in Western Sydney were recruited. Participants were two hundred and twenty five Iraqi refugees resettled in Western Sydney, who had left Iraq no earlier than 1991, were fluent in Arabic and/or English, and were between the ages of 18 and 70. The chief outcome measures used were the Kessler Psychological Distress Scale (K-10) as well as The Harvard Trauma Questionnaire (HTQ).

Results

On the K-10, 39.8% of participants had severe psychological distress, 19.4% moderate distress, and 40.7% had low to mild distress. Ninety-five percent of participants reported having experienced one or more potentially traumatic event (PTE) as defined by the HTQ prior to leaving Iraq, with a mean of 14.28 events (SD = 8.69). Thirty-one percent of participants met the threshold (≥2.5) for clinically significant PTSD symptomatology, with a significantly higher occurrence among participants with lower education attainment (χ² (3) = 8.26, p = .04). Of those participants with clinically significant PTSD symptomatology according to the HTQ, only 32.9% reported ever having ever sought help for a mental health problem.

Conclusions

The high level of distress found in this sample, combined with low uptake of mental health care, highlights the need for programs targeted to promote help-seeking among Iraqi refugees who have resettled in Australia. Further, the higher level of PTSD symptomatology found amongst those with lower education attainment has mental health promotion and treatment implications. Specifically, in designing service and treatment programs, consideration should be given to the possible impact excessive levels of psychological distress may have on learning in refugees, to ensure that those who have been unable to develop proficiency in the English language receive effective care.

【 授权许可】

   
2015 Slewa-Younan et al.; licensee BioMed Central.

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