Consensus criteria for traumatic grief - A preliminary empirical test

Background Studies suggest that symptoms of traumatic grief constitute a di stinct syndrome worthy of diagnosis. Aims A consensus conference aimed to develop and test a criteria set for tr aumatic grief. Method The expert panel proposed consensus criteria for traumatic grief Rec eiver operator characteristic (ROC) analyses tested the performance of the proposed criteria on 306 widowed respondents at seven months post-loss. Results ROC analyses indicated that three of four separation distress sympt oms (e.g. yearning, searching, loneliness) had to be endorsed as at least ' sometimes true' and four of the final eight traumatic distress symptoms (e. g. numbness, disbelief distrust, anger, sense of futility about the future) had to be endorsed as at least 'mostly true' to yield a sensitivity of 0.9 3 and a specificity of 0.93 for a diagnosis of traumatic grief. Conclusions Preliminary analyses suggest the consensus criteria for traumat ic grief have satisfactory operating characteristics, and point to directio ns for further refinement of the criteria set. Declaration of interest Grants received from the National Institute of Ment al Health, the American Suicide Foundation and the Pepper Older Adults Inde pendence Center.