Any disaster affects the victims psychologically and physically but a recent research has indicated that the highest numbers of victims of a certain disaster are psychologically affected because victims are both direct and indirect. Psychological effects of either terrorist attack or natural occurrence may last for a long time and the effects of this problem are massive. This is because psychological effects of a disaster affect the brain of the victim whether the victim was directly affected or indirectly affected. All the victims of a certain disaster whether direct or indirect victims should undergo a period of psychological treatment as early as possible. The objective of the paper is to present a white paper study to emergency response manager (ERM) on past mass- casualty incidents (MCI) and their psychological impact.
Terrorist mass-casualty incident on Madrid train booming in Spain will be the main mass-casualty incident. In March 11 2004, a terrorist attack was organized in the city of Madrid in Spain but the target was four commuter trains. Ten bombs exploded at 7: 37 a.m. in three different train stations where four trains were bombed. 191 people were killed in this attack where 90 percent died on the spot. 1, 800 people were wounded in the attack and millions of people were affected indirectly (Craighead, 2009).
The second mass-casualty incident is a natural one that occurred in the Indian Ocean. In 2004 a 9.1 earthquake occurred in Indian Ocean near Indonesia. The natural disaster affected fourteen countries which are around Indian Ocean, 230, 000 people died in all the fourteen countries. Millions of people were wounded in the attack and also there were millions of indirect victims of the disaster. This is one of the most dangerous disasters that have ever happened in the world’s history (Torres, 2005).
The Essay on Victims Of The Terrorism Attack
Although terrorism has been around for a long time, its dramatic rise in the recent years has made many nations live in panic. According to studies, the main reason why terrorists attack nations is usually in a move to achieve a certain agenda (Hoffman, 2013). For instance, apart from forcing a regime change, they also attack with the intention of disposing a tyrant, instituting social reforms as ...
The two incidents seem different but they are both mass-casualty incidents and their results were the same. As a result of that, the two incidents had the same psychological effect and thus the review will be done for both at the same time. There are various symptoms that are shown by direct victims of mass-casualty incidents. Some psychological effects are usually confused with physical effects for the direct victims because the psychological symptoms appear even before the physical recovery of the victim. The most common psychological symptoms of the two incidents were fear where victims feared small things like sounds, aggressiveness where victims would not corporate with their caretakers or the medical operators for the victims who were hospitalized (In Katz, 2013).
Frequent headache was also a common psychological symptom of these incidents. However, this symptom is usually confused with physical effect of the incidents. Fear was termed as the main symptom and thus there was a need of the establishment of a diagnosis. The diagnosis of this symptom is very simple but effective, it involves subjecting the victim to situations that seem to pose danger to the victim but in real sense they do not. This enables the victim to regain his courage after undergoing various situations that seems to pose danger but they eventually do not. Psychological symptoms are very dangerous to a victim of these incidents and they should be controlled earlier before they destroy some of the body functional organs like the brain.
As discussed earlier, psychological symptoms were found in both the direct and indirect victims of the two mass-casualty incidents. The indirect victims can be family members, co-workers, close friends, business partners or leaders of the direct victims. The level of the relationship between the direct victims and the indirect victims is the main thing that determines the extent of the symptoms although the emotional strength of the indirect victim is also a consideration. Depression, stress and fatigue were the main symptoms that were found in the indirect victims. The effect of these symptoms was also severe as those of direct victims and thus there were short and long time treatments that were offered to them. The short treatment is very simple because it involves taking a victim into an environment where one can forget all the things that have been going through in life. This treatment enables the victim to control depression by forgetting what happened to family members, friend or co-worker (Bongar, 2006).
The Essay on Developmental Apraxia Symptoms, Causes, and Treatments
Apraxia of speech is a neurological condition in which a person finds it impossible to move their mouth or tongue to speak (Apraxia, 2005). There are two main types of apraxia; they are acquired apraxia of speech and developmental apraxia of speech (Apraxia of Speech, 2002). This paper is about Developmental Apraxia of Speech, its symptoms, causes, and appropriate treatments. Developmental apraxia ...
The short treatment cannot solve the symptom of depression fully because the problem comes back immediately the victim moves to the normal environment or the place where the incident took place. As a result of this, long term treatment is very critical in the treatment of these symptoms because it offers a lasting solution. The long treatment involves psychological therapy where victim is undertaken into therapy sessions by psychiatrist, psychiatrist explains to the victim the whole situation of mass-casualty incidents by offering more examples. This enables the victim to adopt the situation and at last the victim forgets the whole thing and thus the issue of depression or headache is dealt with fully.
Conclusion
To wide up the white paper study, mass-casualty incidents discussed above had more psychological victims that the physical victim for both direct and indirect victims. Distinguishing between the psychological symptoms and the physical symptom is one of the most important steps in the psychological treatment of the victims. This is because many physical symptoms are usually similar to psychological one. The psychological treatment of both the direct and indirect victims should be taken seriously because they are all affected in the same way.
The Term Paper on The Psychological And Physical Effects
Discuss the psychological and physical effects of loss and grief: How might an ethical therapist incorporate this knowledge into his/her work? Base your answer of the theories and models presented in Module 7. It is a fact of life that every individual will experience loss and grief at some point in their lives but in certain circumstances they may be unaware of it. Loss can come in many disguises ...
References
Craighead, G. (2009).
High-rise security and fire life safety. Amsterdam: Butterworth-Heinemann/Elsevier.
Torres, J. A. (2005).
Disaster in the Indian Ocean, tsunami 2004. Hockessin, Del: Mitchell Lane Publishers.
In Katz, C. L., & In Pandya, A. A. (2013).
Disaster mental health: Around the world and across time.
Bongar, B., Brown, L. M., Beutler, L. E., Breckenridge, J. N., & Zimbardo, P. G. (2006).
Psychology of Terrorism. New York: Oxford University Press.
