Personal wellbeing in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD): association with PTSD symptoms during and following treatment

BACKGROUND It remains unclear to what extent treatment-related gains in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms translate to improvements in broader domains of personal wellbeing, such as community connectedness, life achievement and security. We sought to determine whether: 1. personal wellbeing improves during the course of a treatment program and 2. changes in core symptom domains (PTSD, anxiety and depression) were associated with improvements in overall personal wellbeing. METHODS Participants (N = 124) completed the PTSD Checklist, the Depression and Anxiety Stress Scales and the Personal Wellbeing Index at the start and end of a 4-week Trauma Focused CBT residential program, as well as 3- and 9-months post-treatment. RESULTS Personal wellbeing improved significantly across the 9-months of the study. Generalised estimating equations analyses indicated that (older) age and improvements in PTSD and depressive symptoms were independent predictors of personal wellbeing across time. CONCLUSIONS Although personal wellbeing improved in tandem with PTSD symptoms, the magnitude of improvement was small. These findings highlight a need to better understand how improvements in personal wellbeing can be optimised following PTSD treatment.