Miranda Olff

• Prof. Dr.
• Editor at Academisch Medisch Centrum Universiteit van Amsterdam

Background Over 6 million people have fled their homes in response to the full-scale invasion of Russian armed forces into Ukraine and are forcibly displaced since the start on 4 February 2022. Refugees, both adults and children, have a high risk of developing mental health disorders, in particular post-traumatic stress disorder, depression and anx...

Background: Identifying robust neural signatures of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms is important to facilitate precision psychiatry and help in understanding and treatment of the disorder. Emergent research suggests structural covariance of early visual regions is associated with later PTSD development. However, large-scale analyses a...

Objective: In their work, police officers are routinely exposed to potentially traumatic events, some of which may also be morally distressing. Moral injury refers to the multidimensional impact of exposure to such potentially morally injurious events (PMIEs). Mainly originating from a military context, there is little empirical research on moral i...

Background: Despite known gender/sex differences in the prevalence of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), potential differences in the associations among PTSD symptoms between men and women in the early post-trauma period are not well-characterized. Objective: This study utilized network analysis to assess potential differences in the association...

Background: Somatic symptoms, such as chronic pain, fatigue, and gastrointestinal disturbances, are commonly reported in individuals with a history of childhood maltreatment (CM), which includes various forms of abuse and neglect experienced before age 18. Although CM is strongly associated with somatic symptoms, the specific relationships between...

Objective: To evaluate the psychometric properties of the Brazilian version of the Global Psychotrauma Screen (GPS). Methods: The scale was tested on two Internet-based samples: GPS-CCC (n = 657) and GPS-Brazil (n = 431). Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) was conducted on GPS-CCC. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA), correlational analysis and se...

The European Journal of Psychotraumatology (EJPT) was launched in 2010. In this editorial, we review the journal's developments over the past 15 years, and discuss some of the current ethical challenges in scientific publishing, including the impact of generative AI. How can we responsibly use these new technologies? Additionally, we present 15 yea...

Background: Trauma exposure in Indonesia is high despite the fact that there is limited accessibility to mental healthcare. Pulihkan Luka (PL) is a web-based trauma psychoeducation intervention that aims to provide a practical solution to overcome barriers to accessing mental healthcare.Objectives: This article aimed to (1) describe the cultural ad...

Background Available empirical evidence on participant-level factors associated with dropout from psychotherapies for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is both limited and inconclusive. More comprehensive understanding of the various factors that contribute to study dropout from cognitive-behavioural therapy with a trauma focus (CBT-TF) is cruc...

Background: Investigating long-term posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) course and its predictors may guide prevention and early intervention strategies following trauma exposure, potentially reducing the long-lasting impact of trauma.Method: N = 155 emergency-admitted adults with (suspected) serious injury were repeatedly assessed until one-year...

Background: Perceived social support is an established predictor of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after exposure to a traumatic event. Gender is an important factor that could differentiate responses to social support, yet this has been little explored. Symptoms of complex PTSD are also common following trauma but have been under-researched...

Background Effective preventive interventions for PTSD rely on early identification of individuals at risk for developing PTSD. To establish early post-trauma who are at risk, there is a need for accurate prognostic risk screening instruments for PTSD that can be widely implemented in recently trauma-exposed adults. Achieving such accuracy and gene...

Background: An increasing number of longitudinal studies investigates long-term PTSD, related outcomes and potential gender differences herein. However, a knowledge gap exists when it comes to studies following individual civilian trauma beyond a decade post-trauma. Objective: To investigate the long-term PTSD prevalence, associated adverse psychol...

Background The PTSD Checklist for DSM-5 (PCL-5) is an internationally widely used self-report questionnaire that can be used to screen for probable diagnosis of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Information on the psychometric properties of the Dutch PCL-5 is currently lacking. Objective We aimed to validate the Dutch PCL-5 in a sample of Dutc...

Childhood maltreatment (CM) is thought to be associated with altered responses to social stimuli and interpersonal signals. However, limited evidence exists that CM is linked to larger comfortable interpersonal distance (CID) – the physical distance humans prefer towards others during social interactions. However, no previous study has investigated...

Objective: Although highly intensive trauma treatment programs show promising results in the treatment of patients with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), it remains uncertain if patients with complex forms of PTSD can benefit equally from these intensive programs. To investigate whether patients with the dissociative subtype of PTSD (PTSD + DS)...

Exposure to war is linked to negative mental health outcomes. Self-compassion and emotional intelligence may foster post-war adjustment processes differently depending on the time since the event happened. This study examines post-traumatic stress symptoms (PTSS) in civilians exposed to the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war shortly after and 6 months post-...

Introduction The Global Psychotrauma Screen (GPS) is a brief transdiagnostic screener that covers a broad range of trauma-related disorders as well as risk factors known to influence the course of symptoms. Methods We analyzed data from African war refugees in Australia (n = 70), including the GPS, the Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-5 Disor...

BACKGROUND The Resilience Evaluation Scale (RES) is a new, free and short self-report questionnaire for measuring psychological resilience. This study aims to translate and assess the psychometric properties of the RES. MATERIALS AND METHOD In the present methodological study, after the translation process, face and content validity were conducted...

Background: Despite its popularity, evidence of the effectiveness of Psychological First Aid (PFA) is scarce. Objective: To assess whether PFA, compared to psychoeducation (PsyEd), an attention placebo control, reduces PTSD and depressive symptoms three months post-intervention. Methods: In two emergency departments, 166 recent-trauma adult survivo...

Background: Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is two to three times more common in women than in men. To better understand this phenomenon, we need to know why men, women, and possibly individuals with other sex/gender identities respond differently to trauma. To stimulate sex and gender sensitive research, the European Journal of Psychotraumato...

Background: Assessment of Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms in individuals with dementia is difficult due to diagnostic challenges like an incomplete self-report, interference of neuropsychiatric symptoms and overlapping comorbid psychiatric symptoms. Objective: These diagnostic challenges are articulated here and an in-depth evaluation...

Background: During peacekeeping missions, military personnel may be involved in or exposed to potentially morally injurious experiences (PMIEs), such as an inability to intervene due to a limited mandate. While exposure to such morally transgressive events has been shown to lead to moral injury in combat veterans, research on moral injury in peacek...

We explored participants’ experiences of a counsellor-supported PTSD Coach mobile application intervention (PTSD Coach-CS) in a randomised controlled trial. PTSD Coach-CS participants, who received the intervention and self-completed a custom-designed questionnaire at intervention completion were included (n = 25; female = 20; ages 19–59; isiXhosa...

This study aims to get more insight into experiences in the process towards mental recovery and the feasibility of providing mental health support to victims of intimate partner violence (IPV) committed by organized crime offenders in The Netherlands. 150 female victims were identified and, when reached, offered the option for safe and anonymous me...

Although the cerebellum contributes to higher-order cognitive and emotional functions relevant to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), prior research on cerebellar volume in PTSD is scant, particularly when considering subregions that differentially map on to motor, cognitive, and affective functions. In a sample of 4215 adults (PTSD n = 1642; Con...

Background: During the COVID-19 pandemic, health-care workers (HCWs) may have been confronted with situations that may culminate in moral injury (MI). MI is the psychological distress that may result from perpetrating or witnessing actions that violate one’s moral codes. Literature suggests that MI can be associated with mental health problems. Ob...

Background This systematic review and individual participant data meta-analysis (IPDMA) examined the overall effectiveness of eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) in reducing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms, achieving response and remission, and reducing treatment dropout among adults with PTSD compared to other psycho...

To widen treatment access for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in resource-constrained South Africa, we evaluated the feasibility and effectiveness of a counsellor-supported PTSD Coach mobile application (app) (PTSD Coach-CS) intervention on PTSD and associated sequelae in a community sample. Participants (female = 89%; black = 77%; aged 19–61)...

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with lower cortical thickness (CT) in prefrontal, cingulate, and insular cortices in diverse trauma-affected samples. However, some studies have failed to detect differences between PTSD patients and healthy controls or reported that PTSD is associated with greater CT. Using data-driven dimensional...

COVID-19 caused a great burden on the healthcare system and led to lockdown measures across the globe. These measures are likely to influence crime rates, but a comprehensive overview on the impact of COVID-19 on crime rates is lacking. The aim of the current study was to systematically review evidence on the impact of COVID-19 measures on crime ra...

Background: The International Trauma Questionnaire (ITQ) is a recent self-report measure to assess the severity and probable posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and complex PTSD (CPTSD) as defined by the 11th revision of the International Classification of Diseases. Few studies have examined the psychometric properties of full and short ITQ versio...

Background Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a complex and heterogeneous mental health condition that can develop after exposure to a traumatic event. Clinical trials have used alternative pharmacological agents to treat PTSD, but their associated neural correlates remain unclear. The present systematic review aims to summarize the changes in...

Background Prior research assessing the psychometric properties of the Global Psychotrauma Screen provided support for its internal consistency reliability, construct validity, convergent validity, and divergent validity in several international samples, but not specifically in a U.S. subsample. Objective The purpose of this study was to assess ps...

Background Recent advances in data-driven computational approaches have been helpful in devising tools to objectively diagnose psychiatric disorders. However, current machine learning studies limited to small homogeneous samples, different methodologies, and different imaging collection protocols, limit the ability to directly compare and generaliz...

To treat the impact of trauma, most current evidence supports the use of trauma-focused psychotherapy as the first line approach. However, millions of individuals exposed to trauma worldwide seek Complementary and Integrative Health (CIH) therapies in hopes of achieving wellness above and beyond reducing symptoms. But what is the evidence for CIH i...

People commonly face adverse circumstances throughout life, which increases risk for psychiatric disorders, such as anxiety, depression, psychosis, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Adversities may occur during different periods in life. Especially adversity during early periods has been suggested to put individuals at risk for adverse ment...

Introduction: Helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) personnel provide on-scene trauma care to patients with high mortality risk. The HEMS work context is characterized by an exceptionally high exposure to critical incidents, emotionally demanding patient encounters, and having to perform under pressure with limited resources. The aim of this...

Introduction: International psychosocial support guidelines reflect consensus on support principles and interventions. However, no consensus exists on what recipients consider important elements of service delivery. Within two contexts – after a potentially traumatic event (PTE) and people with Spinal Muscular Atrophy (SMA)–the aims were to contrib...

Background: Exposure to adversity in utero is thought to increase susceptibility to develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following later life trauma, due to neurobiological programming effects during critical developmental periods. It remains unknown whether effects of prenatal adversity on PTSD susceptibility are modulated by genetic varia...

Background Intrusive traumatic re-experiencing domain (ITRED) was recently introduced as a novel perspective on posttraumatic psychopathology, proposing to focus research of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) on the unique symptoms of intrusive and involuntary re-experiencing of the trauma, namely, intrusive memories, nightmares, and flashbacks....

Background: Timely and effective interventions can alleviate or prevent the development of clinical symptomatology in trauma-exposed individuals. However, due to limited access to these interventions, and/or stigma around accessing mental health services, there is an unmet need. Internet-and mobile-based interventions may help to address this need....

We investigated whether the impact of potentially traumatic events (PTEs) on trauma-related symptoms changes across the transitional adult lifespan (i.e., 16-100 years old) and if this association differs for self-reported COVID-19-related PTEs compared to other PTEs. A web-based cross-sectional study was conducted among 7,034 participants from 88...

Purpose of review: Women are twice as likely to develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) compared to men after a traumatic experience. The purpose of this mini review was to explore recent research on biological contributors to this sex difference. Recent findings: We identified 51 studies published since 2019. Studies found that beyond the...

BACKGROUND: Tonic immobility (TI) is a reflexive, involuntary response that causes motor inhibition, vocal suppression, and analgesia. TI is elicited by extreme fear and perception of entrapment in a life-threatening situation. Research suggests that TI is a frequent peritraumatic response and may be related to subsequent posttraumatic stress disor...

Moral injury is an emerging concept that captures the psychosocial consequences of involvement in and exposure to morally transgressive events. In the past decade, research on moral injury has grown exponentially. In this special collection we review papers on moral injury published in the European Journal of Psychotraumatology from its inception u...

Background: Helicopter emergency medical services (HEMS) personnel provide on-scene trauma care to patients with high mortality risk. Work in the HEMS setting is characterized by frequent exposure to critical incidents and other stressors. The aim of this study was to further our understanding of the factors underlying HEMS personnel wellbeing to...

Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with cognitive dysfunctions and is an independent risk factor for dementia. A recent study has found the prevalence of PTSD in people with dementia is 4.7%-7.8%. However, little is known about the effectiveness of PTSD treatment for people with dementia. The primary aim of the current study is to...

Background Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a complex and heterogeneous mental health condition that can develop after exposure to a traumatic event. Clinical trials have used new pharmacological agents to treat PTSD, but their associated neural correlates remain unclear. The present systematic review aims to summarise the changes in brain f...

2022 was a year of crises, not just one but multiple intersecting crises that caused traumatic stress in billions of people worldwide. COVID-19 is still not over. New wars have started, and the climate change impact is bigger than ever. Will the Anthropocene be an era of continued crises? This past year the European Journal of Psychotraumatology (E...

Background Potentially traumatic events may lead to the development of a wide range of adverse psychological responses, including symptoms of anxiety, depression, and (complex) posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Despite the high prevalence of potentially traumatic events in Iran, there is no population data nor evidence-based instrument to scree...

Providing efficient psychosocial support for survivors of sexual assault is of critical societal importance. Around the globe, technology-based solutions (eHealth) are increasingly being used to accomplish this task, especially following COVID-19. Despite increased importance and reliance on eHealth for sexual assault, minimal efforts have been mad...

Background: Recent years have shown an increased application of prospective trajectory-oriented approaches to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Although women are generally considered at increased PTSD risk, sex and gender differences in PTSD symptom trajectories have not yet been extensively studied. Objective: To perform an in-depth invest...

A recent scandal in the Netherlands painfully underscored that sexual harassment and abuse are unfortunately still happening around the world, even after decades of advocacy on this issue and five years of #MeToo. To make progress in prevention and treatment we argue that we should address sexual violence from a public health perspective. Fruthermo...

Background Psychological resilience is an important factor in coping with Potentially Traumatic Events (PTEs) and might mitigate the development of trauma-related disorders. Due to the high risk of natural disasters, criminal activity, and transportation accidents among the Indonesian population, it is critical to assess psychological resilience as...

Background: Current clinical assessments of Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) rely solely on subjective symptoms and experiences reported by the patient, rather than objective biomarkers of the illness. Recent advances in data-driven computational approaches have been helpful in devising tools to objectively diagnose psychiatric disorders. Here...

Background Young adults’ drinking habits often exceed low-risk drinking guidelines. As young adults show increased access, use, and interest in personalized content related to physical and mental well-being, mobile applications might be a suitable tool to reach this target group. This study investigates the effectiveness of “Boozebuster”, a self-gu...

Childhood maltreatment (CM) is thought to be associated with altered responses to socialstimuli and interpersonal signals. Correspondingly, first studies found that CM is linked tolarger comfortable interpersonal distance (CID). However, studies were limited in statisticalpower and only examined individuals from the European region. Moreover, littl...

Racial discrimination (RD) is unfair treatment of individuals based on race or ethnicity. It is a pervasive and increasing phenomenon in the lives of many individuals with deleterious effects on mental health. Research implicates RD in diminished well-being, lower life satisfaction and self-esteem, and mental health disorders. Furthermore, there ha...

Background The Resilience Evaluation Scale (RES) is a novel and freely available measure of psychological resilience (factored into self-confidence and self-efficacy). To date, psychometric properties were evaluated in Dutch and American samples, but not yet in a Chinese sample. Objective We aimed to validate the RES in a Chinese sample by examini...

Sexually assaulted women represent a particularly high-risk group for developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Potentially traumatic events (PTEs) and peritraumatic dissociation (PD) are known risk factors for PTSD. However, little is known about how previous trauma affects PD and how this relationship affects PTSD. We aimed to investigate...

Background The cerebellum critically contributes to higher-order cognitive and emotional functions such fear learning and memory. Prior research on cerebellar volume in PTSD is scant and has neglected neuroanatomical subdivisions of the cerebellum that differentially map on to motor, cognitive, and affective functions. Methods We quantified cerebe...

Background: The high prevalence of trauma exposure and consequent post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is well documented in low- and middle-income countries, and most individuals with PTSD have limited access to treatment in these settings. Freely available internet-based interventions, such as PTSD Coach (web-based and mobile application), can h...

A number of studies of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) report thinner cerebral cortical gyri using gyrus-based analysis or thinner foci within the gyri using vertex-based analysis. However, the locations of these findings are inconsistent across studies, and the spatial transformations required during vertex-based analysis may affect the focal...

People commonly face adverse circumstances throughout life, which increases risk for psychiatric disorders, such as anxiety, depression, psychosis and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Adversities may occur during different periods in life. Especially adversity during early periods has been suggested to put individuals at risk for adverse menta...

During the COVID-19 pandemic, healthcare professionals are exposed to extreme hazards and workplace stressors. Social media postings by physicians and nurses related to COVID-19 from January 21st to June 1st 2020 were obtained from the Reddit website. Topic modeling via Latent Dirichlet Allocation (LDA) using a machine-learning approach was perform...

Previous studies showed that textual information could be used to screen respondents for posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In this study, we explored the feasibility of using language features extracted from short text descriptions respondents provided of stressful events to predict trauma-related symptoms assessed using the Global Psychotrauma...

Results of neuroimaging datasets aggregated from multiple sites may be biased by site-specific profiles in participants’ demographic and clinical characteristics, as well as MRI acquisition protocols and scanning platforms. We compared the impact of four different harmonization methods on results obtained from analyses of cortical thickness data: (...

Devastating and persisting traumatic memories are a central symptom of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Sleep problems are highly co-occurrent with PTSD and intertwined with its etiology. Notably, sleep hosts memory consolidation processes, supported by sleep spindles (11-16 Hz). Here we assess the hypothesis that intrusive memory symptoms in...

Cognitive and behavioral aspects may mask posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in people with dementia. PTSD severely lowers quality of life in people with dementia. Proper recognition of PTSD is essential to ensure adequate treatment. However, a valid diagnostic tool for PTSD in dementia is lacking. A Delphi study was conducted among 20 Dutch and...

Telomeres are short tandem repeats of “TTAGGG” that protect the chromosome ends from deterioration or fusion of chromosomes. Their repeat length shortens with cell division acting as a biomarker of cellular aging. Traumatic stress events during adulthood or childhood have been associated with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and short leukocyte...

Background A one-stop shop for disaster response services provides a central location for information and advice in an accessible way. Yet little is known about its organization and outcomes. After the MH17 airplane crash, the one-stop shop concept was realized through a digital environment called the Information and Referral Center (IRC). The aim...

Background Text mining and machine learning are increasingly used in mental health care practice and research, potentially saving time and effort in the diagnosis and monitoring of patients. Previous studies showed that mental disorders can be detected based on text, but they focused on screening for a single predefined disorder instead of multiple...

Childhood maltreatment (CM) is linked to impairments in various domains of social functioning. Here, we argue that it is critical to identify factors that underlie impaired social functioning as well as processes that mediate the beneficial health effects of positive relationships in individuals exposed to CM. Key research recommendations are prese...

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a prevalent disorder worldwide and often co‐occurs in dementia. Both have a major impact on disease burden and quality of life. PTSD may be difficult to recognize in dementia and a structured diagnostic method is lacking. In order to get insight into the clinical diagnostics of PTSD in dementia, this systemat...

Background Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is accompanied by disrupted cortical neuroanatomy. We investigated alteration in covariance of structural networks associated with PTSD in regions that demonstrate the case-control differences in cortical thickness (CT) and surface area (SA). Methods Neuroimaging and clinical data were aggregated fro...

A growing body of research demonstrates the association between neighborhood context and health. The underlying biological mechanisms of this association are not fully understood. We conducted a systematic review of studies that investigated the association between neighborhood context and telomere length (TL), a DNA-protein complex that shortens a...

Understanding the neurobiological and cognitive processes underlying the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and its specific symptoms may facilitate preventive intervention development. Severe traumatic stress and resulting biological stress system activations can alter contextual memory processes. This may provide a neurobiologica...

Background Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is associated with markers of accelerated aging. Estimates of brain age, compared to chronological age, may clarify the effects of PTSD on the brain and may inform treatment approaches targeting the neurobiology of aging in the context of PTSD. Method Adult subjects (N = 2229; 56.2% male) aged 18–69...

This is a brief description of a protocol for a systematic scoping review. The scoping review will synthesize the literature pertaining to eHealth interventions targeting the psychosocial impacts of sexual assault.

In individuals with a history of child maltreatment (CM), impairments in many domains of social functioning are well-documented but poorly understood. We summarize evidence for the detrimental effects of CM on social functioning and present key research recommendations focused on: 1. Identifying alterations in specific inter- and intra- personal pr...