The range of symptoms experienced by refugees of war has not been empirically assessed. The New Mexico Refugee Symptom Checklist-121 (NMRSCL-121) was developed utilizing established guidelines and evaluated for its psychometric properties. Community-dwelling Kurdish and Vietnamese refugees reported 48 (SD = 31) persistent and bothersome somatic and psychological symptoms on the NMRSCL-121. Internal consistency and test-retest reliability for the total scale and for most subscales were acceptable, and construct and concurrent validity for the NMRSCL-121 data was shown. There were modest ethnic group differences on symptom severity and psychometric properties of NMRSCL-121 subscales. The NMRSCL-121 produces reliable and valid assessments of a wide range of symptoms in 2 broad community samples of displaced adult refugees. © 2009 by Lippincott Williams & Wilkins.

Measurement, instruments Health Symptoms Refugees Assessment war trauma

symptomatology battle injury depression refugee anxiety disorder psychological aspect internal consistency named inventories, questionnaires and rating scales Follow-Up Studies follow up human sex difference Refugees middle aged statistics war gastrointestinal disease neurologic disease Ethnic Groups ethnic group comparative study Aged Depressive Disorder sensory dysfunction Anxiety Disorders test retest reliability ethnology musculoskeletal disease mental disease United States Young Adult Humans Cross-Cultural Comparison Adolescent male female Viet Nam personality test Personality Inventory reproducibility bleeding Reproducibility of Results cultural factor Psychometrics psychometry Article concurrent validity urinary dysfunction New Mexico skin sensation cardiopulmonary insufficiency major clinical study adult new mexico refugee symptom checklist 121 posttraumatic stress disorder Sex Factors Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic disability Disability Evaluation Torture