Abstract
Aims: Millions have fled from the civil unrest in Syria, and half of these are children and youth. Although they are a population with an elevated risk of health problems due to adverse pre-migratory and post-migratory experiences, few studies have explored their health-related quality of life (HRQoL). This is considered a fundamental construct in public health and might provide complementary descriptions of their health and well-being after resettling in a new country. Methods: This was a cross-sectional study of 160 Syrian youth aged 13–24 years. Using KIDSCREEN-27, the results for five dimensions of HRQoL was compared to population norm data. Demographic factors and war-related adverse events were used to predict HRQoL in hierarchical regression. Results: For most participants, the overall HRQoL was good, but it was lower in the dimensions for friends, physical well-being and psychological well-being compared to population norms. Scores in the dimensions for autonomy/parental relation and the school environment were high and were the main contributors to a positive HRQoL. Age and number of reported stressful events (SE) had the greatest impact on HRQoL, but the final regression model only accounted for 21% of the total variance. Conclusions: HRQoL is a relevant and non-invasive measure for refugee youth. Contributors to lower scores in physical and psychological well-being should be explored further and indicate the potential for future interventions focussing on general psychological well-being and networks, regardless of the SE that have been experienced. These interventions could potentially be based in schools or in families in order to benefit from these being seemingly safe environments for the majority of the group.
Highlights
The global population of forcibly displaced people has grown to more than 70 million [1]
When we compare each dimension to the European population norms, we find that the health-related quality of life (HRQoL) Index is significantly lower in our sample (64.06 vs. 71.93) with a moderate effect size
Repeating the same procedure for the two highest scoring dimensions, we found similar influences, with 19% of variance explained in autonomy/parents, but less of the variance was explained for school environment (12%)
Summary
The global population of forcibly displaced people has grown to more than 70 million [1]. The armed conflict in Syria has caused one of the largest mass movements since World War II, with more than six million on the move. But millions cross the borders to neighbouring countries such as Jordan and Turkey. About one million have fled to Europe and received asylum, with Germany and Sweden receiving the highest number of such applications at 550,000 claims [2]. Syrians are one of the largest groups of refugees in Norway, totalling about 22,000, and almost all are granted permanent settlement [3]. Half of the displaced Syrians are children
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