Abstract
The present chapter seeks to address the painful psychological imprint that extreme disaster events commonly come to bear on survivors and disaster response employees. More specifically, it traces the psychological manifestations directly associated with disaster-induced peritraumatic events and outlines the circumstances under which exposure to life-threatening incidents may—or may not—lead to trauma-related psychopathology. Additionally, it attempts to classify peritraumatic psychopathology based on well-established, scientifically informed taxonomies. Finally, it offers a set of practical, stepwise protection guidelines on prevention and intervention, which combine immediacy and efficiency in their application, therefore minimizing the potential permanence of negative mental health outcomes and increasing the likelihood of reinstating the status of those affected into full functionality as soon as possible following the event.
You are more than a survivor. You have been transformed.
—Eleanor Brownn
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Polemikou, A. (2021). Disaster-Induced Psychological Trauma: Supporting Survivors and Responders. In: Pikoulis, E., Doucet, J. (eds) Emergency Medicine, Trauma and Disaster Management. Hot Topics in Acute Care Surgery and Trauma. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-34116-9_42
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-34116-9_42
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