The National Center for Posttraumatic Stress Disorder

BLANCHARD, E.B., HICKLING, E.J., TAYLOR, A.E., LOOS, W.R., FORNERIS, C.A., & JACCARD, J. (1996). Who develops PTSD from motor vehicle accidents? Behaviour Research and Therapy, 34, 1-10. Within 1 to 4 months of their motor vehicle accident (MVA), we assessed 158 MVA victims who sought medical attention as a result of the MVA. Using the ClinicianAdministered PTSD Scale, we found that 62 (39%) met DSMIII-R criteria for PTSD. Using variables from the victim’s account of the accident and its sequelae, pre-MVA psychosocial functioning, demographic variables, pre-MVA psychopathology and degree of physical injury, we found that 70% of the subjects could be classified as PTSD or not with 4 variables: prior major depression, fear of dying in the MVA, extent of physical injury and whether litigation had been initiated. Using multiple regression to predict the continuous variable of total CAPS score, as a measure of post-traumatic stress symptoms, we found that 8 variables combined to predict 38.1% of variance (Multiple R = 0.617). BLANCHARD, E.B., HICKLING, E.J., TAYLOR, A.E., BUCKLEY, T.C., LOOS, W.R., & WALSH, J. (1998). Effects of litigation settlements on posttraumatic stress symptoms in motor vehicle accident victims. Journal of Traumatic Stress, 11, 337-354. In order to investigate the effects of the initiation of