IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v16y2019i9p1604-d229102.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Post-Traumatic Stress among Evacuees from the 2016 Fort McMurray Wildfires: Exploration of Psychological and Sleep Symptoms Three Months after the Evacuation

Author

Listed:
  • Genevieve Belleville

    (School of Psychology, Laval University, Quebec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada)

  • Marie-Christine Ouellet

    (School of Psychology, Laval University, Quebec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada)

  • Charles M. Morin

    (School of Psychology, Laval University, Quebec, QC G1V 0A6, Canada)

Abstract

This study documents post-traumatic stress symptoms after the May 2016 wildfires in Fort McMurray (Alberta, Canada). A sample of 379 evacuees completed an online questionnaire from July to September 2016, and a subsample of 55 completed a psychiatric/psychological diagnostic interview. According to a self-report questionnaire, 62.5% of respondents had a provisional post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The interview confirmed that 29.1% met criteria for PTSD, 25.5% for depression, and 43.6% for insomnia; in most cases, insomnia was definitely or probably related to the fires. Traumatic exposure may elicit or exacerbate sleep problems, which are closely associated with PTSD after a disaster.

Suggested Citation

  • Genevieve Belleville & Marie-Christine Ouellet & Charles M. Morin, 2019. "Post-Traumatic Stress among Evacuees from the 2016 Fort McMurray Wildfires: Exploration of Psychological and Sleep Symptoms Three Months after the Evacuation," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 16(9), pages 1-14, May.
  • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:9:p:1604-:d:229102
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/9/1604/pdf
    Download Restriction: no

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/16/9/1604/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Lowe, Sarah R. & Joshi, Spruha & Pietrzak, Robert H. & Galea, Sandro & Cerdá, Magdalena, 2015. "Mental health and general wellness in the aftermath of Hurricane Ike," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 124(C), pages 162-170.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Fadia Isaac & Samia R. Toukhsati & Mirella Di Benedetto & Gerard A. Kennedy, 2021. "A Systematic Review of the Impact of Wildfires on Sleep Disturbances," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(19), pages 1-13, September.
    2. Fadia Isaac & Samia R. Toukhsati & Britt Klein & Mirella Di Benedetto & Gerard A. Kennedy, 2023. "Differences in Anxiety, Insomnia, and Trauma Symptoms in Wildfire Survivors from Australia, Canada, and the United States of America," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 21(1), pages 1-15, December.
    3. Wanying Mao & Medard Adu & Ejemai Eboreime & Reham Shalaby & Nnamdi Nkire & Belinda Agyapong & Hannah Pazderka & Gloria Obuobi-Donkor & Ernest Owusu & Folajinmi Oluwasina & Yanbo Zhang & Vincent I. O., 2022. "Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, Major Depressive Disorder, and Wildfires: A Fifth-Year Postdisaster Evaluation among Residents of Fort McMurray," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 19(15), pages 1-21, August.
    4. Magdalena Sycińska-Dziarnowska & Liliana Szyszka-Sommerfeld & Karolina Kłoda & Michele Simeone & Krzysztof Woźniak & Gianrico Spagnuolo, 2021. "Mental Health Interest and Its Prediction during the COVID-19 Pandemic Using Google Trends," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(23), pages 1-14, November.
    5. Emily Ying Yang Chan & Holly Ching Yu Lam, 2020. "Research Frontiers of Health Emergency and Disaster Risk Management: What Do We Know So Far?," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 17(5), pages 1-4, March.
    6. Giuseppina Spano & Mario Elia & Onofrio Cappelluti & Giuseppe Colangelo & Vincenzo Giannico & Marina D’Este & Raffaele Lafortezza & Giovanni Sanesi, 2021. "Is Experience the Best Teacher? Knowledge, Perceptions, and Awareness of Wildfire Risk," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(16), pages 1-12, August.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ran, Liuyi & Wang, Wo & Ai, Ming & Kong, Yiting & Chen, Jianmei & Kuang, Li, 2020. "Psychological resilience, depression, anxiety, and somatization symptoms in response to COVID-19: A study of the general population in China at the peak of its epidemic," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 262(C).
    2. Liat Morgan & Alexandra Protopopova & Rune Isak Dupont Birkler & Beata Itin-Shwartz & Gila Abells Sutton & Alexandra Gamliel & Boris Yakobson & Tal Raz, 2020. "Human–dog relationships during the COVID-19 pandemic: booming dog adoption during social isolation," Palgrave Communications, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 7(1), pages 1-11, December.
    3. Sonja I. Garske & Suzanne Elayan & Martin Sykora & Tamar Edry & Linus B. Grabenhenrich & Sandro Galea & Sarah R. Lowe & Oliver Gruebner, 2021. "Space-Time Dependence of Emotions on Twitter after a Natural Disaster," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(10), pages 1-13, May.
    4. Li, Dongying & Newman, Galen & Zhang, Tiantian & Zhu, Rui & Horney, Jennifer, 2021. "Coping with post-hurricane mental distress: The role of neighborhood green space," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 281(C).
    5. Haoran Chu & Sixiao Liu & Janet Z. Yang, 2021. "Together we survive: the role of social messaging networks in building social capital and disaster resilience among minority communities," Natural Hazards: Journal of the International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, Springer;International Society for the Prevention and Mitigation of Natural Hazards, vol. 106(3), pages 2711-2729, April.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:16:y:2019:i:9:p:1604-:d:229102. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.