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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,...

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Autores principales: De Soir, Erik, Zech, Emmanuelle, Versporten, Ann, Van Oyen, Herman, Kleber, Rolf, Mylle, Jacques, van der Hart, Onno
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: BioMed Central 2015
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.
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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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