Early Traumatic Stress Reactions among Swedish Survivors of the m/s Estonia Disaster

Abstract

BackgroundThis study is a three-month follow-up study in order to assess the short-term impact of traumatic stress among 53 Swedish survivors of the Estonia disaster.MethodA questionnaire consisting of general questions about conditions during and after the disaster and self-assessment by Post Traumatic Symptom Scale (PTSS–10), Impact of Event Scale (IES), Sense of Coherence–short version (SoC–12), and the DSM–IV list of dissociative symptoms of Acute Stress Disorder formulated as questions regarding individual reactions was distributed.ResultsThe response rate was 79.2% (n=42). The participants scored an average of 3.9 on PTSS–10, 28.5 on IES (‘intrusion’ and ‘avoidance’ subscales) and 62.8 on SoC–12, which shows elevated levels of post-traumatic stress reactions but a normal level of sense of coherence. The reported occurrence of dissociative symptoms during the disaster was as follows: emotional numbing in 43% of the survivors, reduction of awareness in 55%, derealisation in 67%, depersonalisation in 33%, and dissociative amnesia in 29%. Survivors scoring low in SoC scored significantly higher in both PTSS–10 and IES than those with high scores in SoC. All dissociative symptoms were predictive of post-traumatic reactions.ConclusionsThis study substantiates the importance of assessing dissociative symptoms during a life-threatening event as a possible predictor for later post-traumatic reactions and possible PTSD. The Sense of Coherence Scale may be useful as an instrument to sort out survivors at risk.