Introduction
anxiety, adversity, PTSD, depression/anxiety, depression
The war in Syria has led to an unprecedented number of forcibly displaced people. Almost 7 million refugees have sought refuge primarily in neighbouring countries as well as in Europe.To improve the access to evidence-based psychological interventions in underserved communities, the WHO developed a series of scalable interventions. One of these is Problem Management Plus (PM+), developed to target depression, anxiety and general distress in communities affected by adversity.The STRENGTHS consortium investigates the effectiveness, cost-effectiveness and implementation of PM+ for Syrian refugees in countries in Europe and the Middle East.This study aimed to evaluate the effectiveness of PM+ on symptoms of depression/anxiety (total score; primary outcome) and on depression, anxiety, symptoms of PTSD, functional impairment and self-identified problems among Syrian refugees in the Netherlands.