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Abstract
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BACKGROUND: Comorbid common mental disorders (CMDs) are pervasive in refugee populations. However, limited research has explored psychosocial factors for mental disorder comorbidity in Somali refugee samples.
AIMS: This study aims to explore potential risk and protective factors for comorbid depression-anxiety and comorbid depression-PTSD by examining associations between trauma exposure, psychosocial factors, and mental health symptoms among a sample of Somali refugees displaced in urban Kenya.
METHODS: We used snowball sampling to recruit Somali youth aged 15 to 35years(N = 250,n = 143 female, n = 88 male, n = 19 unknown gender). We measured 16 common types of trauma exposure and three psychosocial factors (endorsing violence, willingness to share problems, and symptom awareness) and used the HSCL-25 and PCL-C to capture individual and comorbid CMD symptoms, using guided cutoff points and/or algorithms. We then ran a series of logistic regression analyses to examine relationships between trauma exposure, psychosocial factors, and individual and comorbid CMD symptoms.
RESULTS: Findings showed that increased trauma exposure predicted symptoms of individual and comorbid CMDs. Increased symptom awareness and endorsement of violence predicted comorbid depression-PTSD and comorbid anxiety-depression symptoms, respectively. Willingness to share problems buffered depressive symptoms but did not predict comorbidity.
CONCLUSIONS: These findings revealed the high CMD comorbidity prevalence with differential effects of trauma and psychosocial factors on individual or comorbid mental disorders. This study suggests a need for transdiagnostic approaches that cut across Western diagnostic boundaries and consider culturally responsive and relevant items for mental health measures.
Language: en |