The study investigated the burn survivors’ long-term psychological response and resilience toward a mass burn casualty of the Formosa Color Dust Explosion in Taiwan during the three-year integrated service period in 2015-2018. The aims of this study were two-folds. Firstly we aimed to describe the three-year follow-up data focusing on the psychological conditions of the burn cohort of the explosion event. Secondly we attempted to interpret fluctuations of the psychological resilience in the three-year observations.
Methods:
Longitudinal observations with questionnaire interview were employed in this study. Among the 484 burn survivors out of 499 victims, periodical telephone contact with 4-wave follow-ups were administered by trained interviewers during Nov. 2015-Jun. 2018. Demographic, medical and psychosocial information were collected consistently in the four waves among the respondents. Four hundred survivors received psychiatric assessment in designated hospitals in Dec. 2016.
Results:
The response rates of the four interviews were 65.1, 74.2, 76.9, and 78.5 percent, respectively. The burn survivors were mean-aged 23.1±8.7 years old and characteristic of 2-3 degree of burn over 50% of area. The 4-wave respondents consisted of similar backgrounds of gender, age and total body surface area. The resilience feature in coping with the long-term stress in the first two years of recovery was salient. While the respondents presented with decreasing trend of mental distress or other stress-related symptoms such as anxiety and post-traumatic symptoms in the 3-year period, substance use including hypnotics and alcohol consumptions slightly increased at the final wave. The bounced anxiety and stress-related stress symptoms with the concurrent trend of increasing substance use were of attention.
Conclusion:
Young burn survivors may recover in both psychological and physical conditions with family support and psychological resilience in the first two years, yet longer term post-traumatic mental distress arising in the process of community reintegration should draw much attention to healthcare providers and family members.