The level of the post traumatic stress disorder in the war victim children and youngsters coming from Syria and Iraq

This study aimed to identify the PTSD level and its progress in the Iraqi and Syrian refugees who took refuge in Turkey and lived in three different areas. Iraqi refugees livedin a camp located in the city of Diyarbakır and a camp located in a district of Batman called Beşiri. Syrian refugees did not live in a camp but lived in the city center of Batman. The study also aimed to investigate the relationship between TSSB and various socio-demographic variables and information variables regarding certain events; to identify the level of post-war psychological suffer, the effects caused by the war and necessary precautions that must be taken. A total of 202 refugees from the three areas participated in the study: Iraqi refugees from Diyarbakır camp and Batman camp; and Syrian refugees from the city center of Batman. A 36-item scale was employed to find out if the refugees had PTSD and the level of violence if they had it. The scale consisted of 7 sections. The first section identifies the sings of the individuals' reliving, the second section identifies the sings of avoidance and blunting, the third section identifies the sings of hyper-arousal, the fourth section identifies the duration of the disorder, the fifth section identifies serious problems and functional disorder, the sixth section identifies the PTSD diagnose and the seventh section identifies the related characteristics. The findings of the research obtained from 123 male and 79 female participants indicated that the current PTSD frequency of Iraqi and Syrian refugees was %57,9 over the last month andlife-long PTSD frequency was %58,9. It was found out the possibility of the PTSD diagnosis in the refugees increased as they grew up, lost a member of their family and a friend, were sexually abused, witnessed explosions and were subjected to violence. It was found out that the average of the current violence PTSD points of Iraqi and Syrian refugees who took part in the study was 78,07 over the last month and the average of the life-long violence PTSD points was 81,28. Considering the violence points of the CAPS scale between 0 and 136, it can be said that both the average of the current violence PTSD points and the average of the life-long violence PTSD points the average of the life-long violence TSSB points was high. A significant correlation at medium level towards a positive way (p<.05) was found between the current points of PTSD diagnose and the life-long PTSD points, and variables such asparticipants' witnessing war casualties, explosions and death, being taken as a hostage, being exposed to violence and sexual abuse, being injured or having an accident. When the level and direction of the relationship between the situations that the participants experienced and the current and life-long PTSD diagnoses, the variable of "witnessing or being subjected to sexual abuse" came first in increasing the risk of having PTSD, the variable of "losing a member or members of family" was ranked as the second, the variable of "witnessing the death of a family member or a close friend came the third, the variable of "witnessing or being subjected to torture or violence during the war" was in the fourth place, the variable of "having an accident or being seriously injured came the fifth and the variable of "witnessing visually or aurally an explosion" was ranked as the final. Key words: PTSD, war, refugee, trauma, child, young