Associations between adverse childhood experiences and migraine among teenage mothers in Peru

A psychometric analysis of the Early Trauma Inventory-Short Form in Colombia: CTT and Rasch model

BACKGROUND

Potential childhood traumatic experiences increase risk for mental and physical health disorders and their precise assessment can help to promote health prevention and promotion strategies for countries with limited data and measurement strategies like Colombia.

OBJECTIVE

The goal of the present study is to strengthen evidence for the validity of scores from an adapted version of the Early Trauma Inventory self report-short form (ETI-SF) using Item Response Theory and by assessing factorial invariance across gender and education level.

PARTICIPANTS AND SETTING

The study assessed a total of 1909 Colombian participants (66.16 % women, 32.16 % men, 1.68 % other gender; age range 18-72 years old).

METHODS

Participants answered the ETI-SF via a web-based sampling strategy.

RESULTS

The total scores of the scale showed good reliability coefficients (α = 0.81 and ω = 0.60). A specific analysis for the subscales showed good reliability for the emotional, physical, and sexual trauma subscales (αs and ωs >0.64), while general trauma showed lower than accepted reliability values (α =0.56 and ω = 0.37). Most of the individual items of the scale showed good calibration. The factorial invariance analysis suggests the possibility of some gender and educational differences.

CONCLUSIONS

The study confirms particularly high rates of potential childhood traumatic experiences in Colombia and complement data for specific trauma types. Overall, the ETI-SF is confirmed as useful for Colombia, which highlights this scale as a good tool to use for public health assessment. Future research can continue the integration of diverse methods for estimating the quality of the scale.

Migraine, associated factors, and functional disability in medical students at a peruvian university during the COVID-19 pandemic: An analytical cross-sectional study

Background

It is unknown whether the confinement caused by the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic may influence migraine triggers. This study aimed to determine the frequency of migraine and their associated factors in medical students at a Peruvian university. The characteristics of migraine episodes and degree of functional disability caused by migraine were also evaluated.

Methods

An analytical cross-sectional study was conducted on medical students of a Peruvian university. The suspected migraine was determined with the Migraine Screen Questionnaire. Sociodemographic, confounding, and COVID-19 pandemic-related variables were included as possible associated factors. Poisson regression models were used, and crude and adjusted prevalence ratios with 95% confidence intervals were estimated.

Results

The participants comprised 327 students, and 30.3% (n = 99) had suspected migraine. Sex, clustered semesters, having family members with migraine and COVID-19 risk factors, and hours in front of the computer were associated with a higher probability of migraine. However, having more hours of sleep per day was associated with a lower probability. Moreover, most students with migraine had a severe functional disability (41.4%).

Conclusions

The high frequency of migraine in medical students could be due to COVID-19-related quarantine. Certain pandemic-related factors increase the probability of having migraine. A high level of disability should promote timely diagnosis and follow-up in affected students.