@article{ref1,
title="A Brief Report of Surveillance of Traumatic Experiences and Exposures After the Earthquake-Tsunami in American Samoa, 2009",
journal="Disaster medicine and public health preparedness",
year="2013",
author="King, Michael E. and Schreiber, Merritt D. and Formanski, Stephen E. and Fleming, Sinclair and Bayleyegn, Tesfaye M. and Lemusu, Siitia S.",
volume="7",
number="3",
pages="327-331",
abstract="Context:  Rapid mental health surveillance during the acute phase of a disaster response can inform the allocation of limited clinical resources and provide essential household-level risk estimates for recovery planning. Objective:  To describe the use of the PsySTART Rapid Mental Health Triage and Incident Management System for individual-level clinical triage and traumatic exposure assessment in the aftermath of a large-scale disaster. Methods:  We conducted a cross-sectional, comparative review of mental health triage data collected with the PsySTART system from survivors of the September 2009 earthquake-tsunami in American Samoa. Data were obtained from two sources-secondary triage of patients and a standardized community assessment survey-and analyzed descriptively. The main outcome measures were survivor-reported traumatic experiences and exposures-called triage factors-associated with risk for developing severe distress and new mental health disorders following disasters. Results:  The most common triage factors reported by survivors referred for mental health services were &quot;felt extreme panic/fear&quot; (93%) and &quot;felt direct threat to life&quot; (93%). The most common factor reported by persons in tsunami-affected communities was &quot;felt extreme panic or fear&quot; (75%). Proportions of severe triage factors reported by persons living in the community were consistently lower than those reported by patients referred for mental health services. Conclusions:  The combination of evidence-based mental health triage and community assessment gave hospital-based providers, local public health officials, and federal response teams a strategy to match limited clinical resources with survivors at greatest risk. Also, it produced a common operating picture of acute and chronic mental health needs among disaster systems of care operating in American Samoa.<p /> <p>Language: en</p>",
language="en",
issn="1935-7893",
doi="10.1001/dmp.2012.11",
url="http://dx.doi.org/10.1001/dmp.2012.11"
}