Are the elderly more vulnerable to psychological impact of natural disaster? A population-based survey of adult survivors of the 2008 Sichuan earthquake

BMC Public Health

Research Article

Zhisheng Shun¹  Yang Cao²  Weizhi Liu³  Jin Yan³  Wenhua Tian⁴  Zhaobao Jia⁴ 

[1] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Aba Tibetan and Qiang Autonomous Prefecture, Sichuan province, China;Department of Health Statistics, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China;Department of Psychology, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China;Faculty of Health Service, Second Military Medical University, Shanghai, China;

关键词: Mental Health;    Mental Health Service;    Ptsd Symptom;    Mental Health Symptom;    Local Mental Health;   

DOI  :  10.1186/1471-2458-10-172

 received in 2009-12-29, accepted in 2010-03-30,  发布年份 2010

来源: Springer

【 摘 要 】

BackgroundThe association between ages and psychological impact of natural disasters has not been well characterized. A population-based study was conducted 15 months after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake to assess whether elderly survivors were more likely to develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and general psychiatric morbidity.MethodsA population-based survey of 327 survivors (152 elders, 175 younger adults) was conducted in severely affected areas by the earthquake, using a multi-stage systematic sampling design.ResultsCompared with the younger adult survivors, the elderly were more likely to have symptoms of PTSD (22.5% vs. 8.0%, p = 0.001) and general psychiatric morbidity (42.0% vs. 25.4%, p = 0.003). Risk factors, such as being elderly, having been in serious danger, having lost family members, and having felt guilt concerning one's death or injury were significantly associated with developing PTSD; being elderly, having family members or friends seriously injured, and having felt guilt concerning one's death or injury were significantly associated with developing general psychiatric morbidity. Utilization of mental health services is strongly associated with the decreased risk for developing both of the symptoms.ConclusionCompared with the younger adults, the elderly survivors were more likely to develop PTSD and general psychiatric morbidity. More mental health services should be distributed to the elderly and groups at particular risk, to ensure their smooth mental health reconstruction after the earthquake.

【 授权许可】

Unknown   
© Jia et al; licensee BioMed Central Ltd. 2010. This article is published under license to BioMed Central Ltd. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.