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Meta-Analysis of Long-Term Effects of Disasters on Mental Health and PTSD

This presentation provides the meta-analysis of long-term psychological effects of critical events, defined as single, sudden, with clear beginning and ending, resulting in major disruption of community functions, natural or human made, requiring mobilization of major efforts. Wars and armed conflicts except terrorism were excluded. Long-term was any period longer than 6 months. The primary studies included journal articles, chapters, dissertations, conference papers or unpublished reports produced between 1980 and 2013. Literature search included databases PsycINFO, SocINDEX, Medline, Web of Science, Scopus, Academic Search Complete, and PILOTS with 1, 036 documents identified. The eligible studies used either cross-sectional or prospective research designs. The number of studies enabled meta- analysis of four outcomes in the affected groups: General mental health was poorer at 12 months and 6.6 years post-disaster ; post-traumatic stress symptoms remained higher at 8.4 years ; 3 years post disaster odds for prevalence of PTSD diagnoses were 4:1 ; depression symptoms were moderately and significantly higher only beyond 18 months indicating a possible delayed depression response ; 11 years post-disaster odds for depression diagnoses were 5:1. Individuals affected by disasters have worse long-term mental health outcomes compared to the non-affected or to the pre-disaster period.

Long-term effects of disasters; Meta-analysis of effects of disasters; Disasters and mental health

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