Research News You Can Use: Survivors of Natural Disasters and Mass Violence

Carolyn Wilken, Ph.D., Extension Gerontologist.

Young, B. H., Ford, J. L.C.S.W., Ford, J. D., & Watson, Survivors of natural disasters and mass violence. U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs National Center for Post Traumatic Stress Disorders. Retrieved March 14, 2006 from http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/facts/disasters/fs_survivors_disaster.html

Each year millions of people around the world are impacted by natural and technological disasters. While the immediate impact of hurricanes, tsunamis, tornados, and terrorist attacks are easily recognized by the physical and environmental destruction the psychological impacts on the victims is often overlooked or is not manifest until months following the disaster.

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is defined as a psychiatric disorder that can occur after experiencing or witnessing a life-threatening event such as war, hurricanes, terrorist incidents, serious accidents or personal attacks. Although most survivors return to normal in time, some have stress reactions that are not easily resolved resulting in Posttraumatic Stress Disorder. Symptoms of PTSD include, reliving the traumatic event through nightmares and flashbacks, sleeping problems and feeling of detachment. Sometimes these symptoms can be severe enough and last long enough to impair the person's daily life in a significant way. Physical and mental health problems associated with PTSD include depression, substance abuse, memory problems, and other physical and mental health problems. PTSD also affects its victim’s social and family life, ability to function in the work place, marital problems and divorce, family difficulties and problems with parenting.

The authors identify four types of reactions to PTSD:

Emotional reactions: temporary (i.e., for several days or a couple of weeks) feelings of shock, fear, grief, anger, resentment, guilt, shame, helplessness, hopelessness, or emotional numbness (difficulty feeling love and intimacy or difficulty taking interest and pleasure in day-to-day activities)

Cognitive reactions: confusion, disorientation, indecisiveness, worry, shortened attention span, difficulty concentrating, memory loss, unwanted memories, self-blame.

Physical reactions: tension, fatigue, edginess, difficulty sleeping, bodily aches or pain, startling easily, racing heartbeat, nausea, change in appetite, change in sex drive.

Interpersonal reactions, in relationships at school, work, in friendships, in marriage, or as a parent: distrust; irritability; conflict; withdrawal; isolation; feeling rejected or abandoned; being distant, judgmental, or over-controlling.

Predictors of increased risk for PTSD and lasting readjustment problems are greatest if the victim either directly experienced or witnessed any of the following during or after the disaster:

Loss of loved ones or friends

Life threatening danger or physical harm (especially to children)

Exposure to gruesome death, bodily injury, or dead or maimed bodies

Extreme environmental or human violence or destruction

Loss of home, valued possessions, neighborhood, or community

Loss of communication with or support from close relations

Intense emotional demands (e.g., rescue personnel and caregivers searching for possibly dying survivors or interacting with bereaved family members)

Extreme fatigue, weather exposure, hunger, or sleep deprivation

Extended exposure to danger, loss, emotional/physical strain

Exposure to toxic contamination (such as gas or fumes, chemicals, radioactivity)

Most people can ‘handle’ a single stressful event, but when the stress begins to ‘pile up’, the individual’s, or the family’s ability to cope may become proportionally compromised. How individuals, families, and communities respond to stressful event such as natural (or man-made) disasters depends upon the resources that are available prior to and following the disaster.

Role of Extension Faculty in Protecting Others & Themselves

Extension professionals often find themselves in the midst of disaster situations, such as hurricanes-and personally at risk for PTSD. While there are often limitations on what can and must happen ‘on the scene’, the authors recommend these tips as strategies to help prevent PTSD:

Protect: Find a safe haven that provides shelter; food and liquids; sanitation; privacy; and chances to sit quietly, relax, and sleep at least briefly.

Direct: Begin setting and working on immediate personal and family priorities to enable you and your significant others to preserve or regain a sense of hope, purpose, and self-esteem.

Connect: Maintain or reestablish communication with family, peers, and counselors in order to talk about your experiences. Take advantage of opportunities to "tell your story" and to be a listener to others as they tell theirs, so that you and they can release the stress a little bit at a time.

Select: Identify key resources, such as FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Agency), the Red Cross, the Salvation Army, or the local and state health departments, for clean up, health, housing, and basic emergency assistance.