Post-traumatic Stress Disorder in Children and Adolescents: From Sigmund Freud's “Trauma” to Psychopathology and the (Dys)metabolic Syndrome

Post-traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety syndrome that develops after exposure to traumatic life events. Symptoms include re-experience of the initial trauma, avoidance of stimuli associated with the trauma and symptoms of excessive arousal. Neuroendocrine studies in adults with PTSD have demonstrated that basal cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) CRH levels are elevated and urinary cortisol levels are variable - low in the majority of cases - whereas other studies demonstrate no differences in urinary and plasma cortisol concentrations. Urinary catecholamine excretion is higher in PTSD patients than those of control subjects and other psychiatric disorders.