A self-report measure to screen for trauma history and its application to women in inpatient treatment for trauma-related disorders

The authors developed the Trauma History Screen to screen for potentially traumatic events in women admitted for specialized treatment of trauma-related disorders. The questionnaire contains 14 items assessing commonly occurring traumas, and respondents indicate the frequency with which they have experienced the traumas as well as the age at which the trauma occurred. Six items pertaining to interpersonal trauma form an internally consistent subscale. The authors present normative data for a sample of 102 traumatized patients as well as correlations with scores from the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, the Impact of Event Scale, and the Dissociative Experiences Scale. The findings provide some indication of convergent validity for the Trauma History Screen, and the authors recommend using the questionnaire to alert clinicians to trauma that should be explored more fully in the context of a clinical relationship.