Posttraumatic stress disorder: An overview of the concept.

Abstract

He tried to make love to her. . . . until he was defeated by sadness, or shame, and pushed her away. . . . But darkness was not good; he needed the rectangle of light from the street, because without it he felt trapped again in the abyss of the timeless ninety centimeters of his cell, fermenting in his own excrement, delirious . . . he knew that he was coming apart, as he had so often before, and he gave up the struggle, releasing his last hold on the present, letting himself plunge down the endless precipice. He felt the crusted straps on his ankles and wrists, the brutal charge, the torn tendons, the insulting voices demanding names, the unforgettable screams of Ana, tortured beside him, and of the others, hanging by their arms in the courtyard.From "Our Secret," by Isabelle AllendeWhen he came home [from Vietnam] though, Henry was very different, and I'll say this: the change was no good. You could hardly expect him to change for the better, I know. But he was quiet, so quiet, and never comfortable sitting still anywhere but always up and moving around. . . . now you couldn't get him to laugh, or when he did it was more the sound of a man choking, a sound that stopped up the throats of other people around him. They got to leaving him alone most of the time, and I didn't blame them. It was a fact: Henry was jumpy and mean.From "The Red Convertible," by Louise Erdrich THE PTSD CONCEPTExposure to trauma has been a risk of the human experience throughout human history. Emotional reactions to extreme stress have been noted by historians and literary authors for 4,000 years (e.g., Figley, 1993;Veith, 1965 ). Homer's Ulysses (and probably Achilles) and Shakespeare's Henry I I

Rwanda – lasting imprints of a genocide: trauma, mental health and psychosocial conditions in survivors, former prisoners and their children

“…Overall, the present study demonstrated a high degree of co-morbidity between diverse disorders, as postulated earlier [33-35]. Altogether, one quarter of all adult survivors suffered from PTSD, clinically relevant depression and/or anxiety, reflecting the serious mental health situation as well as the long-term consequences of massive violence even 16 years following the genocide [36-38].…”

El Salvador earthquakes: Relationships among acute stress disorder symptoms, depression, traumatic event exposure, and resource loss

“…The findings also extend research suggesting that experience with traumatic stressors can be a risk factor for psychological distress (Freedy, Kilpatrick, & Resnick, 1993;Friedman & Marsella, 1996). Prior to these earthquakes, persons in El Salvador experienced repeated traumatic stressors that exposed a large number of people to horror, were beyond the control of any one person, and threatened the lives of tens of thousands of people (cf.…”

Post‐Traumatic Stress Disorder in Turkish Child and Adolescent Survivors Three Years after the Marmara Earthquake

“…In an extensive literature review, Norris et al (2002) found that specifically two groups of trauma victims (children and the survivors from developing countries) have more risk of developing mental health problems after natural disasters. In contrast, the majority of traumatic stress literature reports the reactions of adult trauma survivors in economically developed countries (Davis & Siegel, 2000; Friedman & Marsella, 1996). Lack of understanding of post‐trauma reactions of young trauma survivors and survivors from developing countries prevents us from addressing their psychological needs.…”