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Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion
BACKGROUND: This paper investigates risk factors for the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms in the different survivor groups involved in a technological disaster in Ghislenghien (Belgium). A gas explosion instantly killed five firefighters, one police officer and 18 other people. Moreover,...
Autores principales: | , , , , , , |
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Formato: | Online Artículo Texto |
Lenguaje: | English |
Publicado: |
BioMed Central
2015
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Materias: | |
Acceso en línea: | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4403847/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25897400 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13690-015-0069-9 |
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author | De Soir, Erik Zech, Emmanuelle Versporten, Ann Van Oyen, Herman Kleber, Rolf Mylle, Jacques van der Hart, Onno |
author_facet | De Soir, Erik Zech, Emmanuelle Versporten, Ann Van Oyen, Herman Kleber, Rolf Mylle, Jacques van der Hart, Onno |
author_sort | De Soir, Erik |
collection | PubMed |
description | BACKGROUND: This paper investigates risk factors for the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms in the different survivor groups involved in a technological disaster in Ghislenghien (Belgium). A gas explosion instantly killed five firefighters, one police officer and 18 other people. Moreover, 132 people were wounded among which many suffered severe burn injuries. METHODS: In the framework of a large health survey of people potentially involved in the disaster, data were collected from 3,448 households, of which 7,148 persons aged 15 years and older, at 5 months (T1) and at 14 months (T2) after the explosion. Hierarchical regression was used to determine the significant predictors and to assess their proportion in variance accounted for. RESULTS: The degree of exposure to the disaster was a predictor of the severity of posttraumatic stress symptoms. Peritraumatic dissociation appeared to be the most important predictor of the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1. But at T2, posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1 had become the most important predictor. Dissatisfaction with social support was positively linked to development of posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1 and to the maintenance of these symptoms at T2. Survivors who received psychological help reported significant benefits. CONCLUSIONS: In harmony with the findings from studies on technological disasters, at T1 6,0% of the respondents showed sufficient symptoms to meet all criteria for a full PTSD. At T2, 6,6% still suffered from posttraumatic stress symptoms. The symptoms of the different victim categories clearly indicated the influence of the degree of exposure on the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms. Problems inherent to retrospective scientific research after a disaster are discussed. |
format | Online Article Text |
id | pubmed-4403847 |
institution | National Center for Biotechnology Information |
language | English |
publishDate | 2015 |
publisher | BioMed Central |
record_format | MEDLINE/PubMed |
spelling | pubmed-44038472015-04-21 Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion De Soir, Erik Zech, Emmanuelle Versporten, Ann Van Oyen, Herman Kleber, Rolf Mylle, Jacques van der Hart, Onno Arch Public Health Research BACKGROUND: This paper investigates risk factors for the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms in the different survivor groups involved in a technological disaster in Ghislenghien (Belgium). A gas explosion instantly killed five firefighters, one police officer and 18 other people. Moreover, 132 people were wounded among which many suffered severe burn injuries. METHODS: In the framework of a large health survey of people potentially involved in the disaster, data were collected from 3,448 households, of which 7,148 persons aged 15 years and older, at 5 months (T1) and at 14 months (T2) after the explosion. Hierarchical regression was used to determine the significant predictors and to assess their proportion in variance accounted for. RESULTS: The degree of exposure to the disaster was a predictor of the severity of posttraumatic stress symptoms. Peritraumatic dissociation appeared to be the most important predictor of the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1. But at T2, posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1 had become the most important predictor. Dissatisfaction with social support was positively linked to development of posttraumatic stress symptoms at T1 and to the maintenance of these symptoms at T2. Survivors who received psychological help reported significant benefits. CONCLUSIONS: In harmony with the findings from studies on technological disasters, at T1 6,0% of the respondents showed sufficient symptoms to meet all criteria for a full PTSD. At T2, 6,6% still suffered from posttraumatic stress symptoms. The symptoms of the different victim categories clearly indicated the influence of the degree of exposure on the development of posttraumatic stress symptoms. Problems inherent to retrospective scientific research after a disaster are discussed. BioMed Central 2015-04-13 /pmc/articles/PMC4403847/ /pubmed/25897400 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13690-015-0069-9 Text en © De Soir et al.; licensee BioMed Central. 2015 This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. The Creative Commons Public Domain Dedication waiver (http://creativecommons.org/publicdomain/zero/1.0/) applies to the data made available in this article, unless otherwise stated. |
spellingShingle | Research De Soir, Erik Zech, Emmanuelle Versporten, Ann Van Oyen, Herman Kleber, Rolf Mylle, Jacques van der Hart, Onno Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title | Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title_full | Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title_fullStr | Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title_full_unstemmed | Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title_short | Degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of PTSD symptoms in the aftermath of the Ghislenghien gas explosion |
title_sort | degree of exposure and peritraumatic dissociation as determinants of ptsd symptoms in the aftermath of the ghislenghien gas explosion |
topic | Research |
url | https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4403847/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25897400 http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13690-015-0069-9 |
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