As a member of the Israel-New Zealand Friendship group, Mrs Dean was invited to a refugee camp at the Jordanian town on Ramtha as part of a two-day goodwill mission to Israel, Jordan and Palestine on May 17.
Although she praised the way refugees were being treated, she said it was clear many of them faced an uncertain future.
"We went up to a town, which was in the north of Jordan, about 20km from the Syrian border, and first of all we met with the deputy governor whose job it was to process the refugees crossing the Syrian border at night.
"What he and his team did was to receive refugees crossing the border. Those that needed immediate medical attention get shunted straight off to hospital and the rest of them go into what is a transit camp.
"We went into the transit camp where families stay for between 24 hours to three days.
"If they have families within Jordan who are prepared to sponsor them, they can then be sponsored and go into Jordan to live as citizens. If they can't and they don't have the funds to get out of the Middle East, then they go into a couple of other camps.
"We went into a family camp and we went into the single men's camp.
"The conditions were very, very rudimentary, but they were fed and had medical assistance.
"They were really desperate to get their point across to the outside world - there was one woman who said to me that her kids had got fleas and she was really distressed about it.
"These people are pretty desperate.
"The emotional temperature rose considerably while we were there - it's the sheer desperation that they have.
"They have lost everything, they have left their jobs and lives and just at this moment they don't have a future.
"They said around 250 people a night are crossing the border, and we saw everything from the elderly to a new-born baby."
During a visit to the transit camp, Mrs Dean said she met a couple and their five children who had made a five-day journey on foot from Homs to cross the border - just a week before the massacre of over 100 people, including 49 children, near Homs on May 25.
"The mother was really pale and shocked, and her mother had been run over by a tank [and] the husband's cousin had also been shot and killed, so they told us.
"They had fled Syria with nothing, but certainly their lives were completely changed for ever."
Mrs Dean, a former Foreign Affairs Select Committee member, said she had been impressed with the attitude of the Jordanians towards the refugees, many of whom had been well aware of New Zealand's humanitarian efforts in the region, which included a pledge of $1 million a year towards helping Syrian refugees through the UN Work and Relief Agency, and the contribution of six defence force personnel towards the UN observer presence inside Syria.
It was apparent New Zealand had a "good reputation" as a "principled country," she said.
