hi HelgaDE...sorry took a while to get back here...

i don't know much about PTSD or what would cause it - other than rapes and war...stuff like that...

but i do know that you can be majorly, severely traumatized by hospitalization

i was hospitalized when i was 19 back about a dozen years ago (like Evangelista said - restraints were not as regulated) though i was not restrained many of the elderly dementia patients were. i heard unanswered cries for help at night. lots of scary sights and sounds.

i was sedated one night. the next day an elderly dementia patient stripped naked and laid in a girls bed. it scared me to death that the patients were so easily lost track of. the girl walked in and found him. like your story - the staff just laughed...i demanded to see my social worker and was released against medical advice - stating i feared for my safety!

although nothing happened to me in the hospital - i was NOT sexually assualted. the fact that i was sedated so heavily combined with the fact that the staff did not keep track of patients combined with the fact that i was in a room with no roomate and two young men were just across the hall...i had this irrational fear that i was pregnant! i KNEW logically i wasn't!! it was not until 9 months later that i started to feel some relief about the entire situation...9 months and no baby...i was truly safe!

i was just recently hospitalized in the same facility. i was terrified!!! when i arrived at the facility - my blood pressure (which is usually normal) was something liek 160/117. the nurse was worried i would have a stroke. they had to give me medication to bring my bp down.

i turned out that the years since my first hospitalization many changes had taken place. patients weren't left to wander unattended. restraints were used only in the most severe case - and not in front of other patients. it was more orderly and well mananged. so i felt much safer...

so as far as i'm concerned - i don't know about PTSD - but i am damn sure about being traumatized in the hospital