Healthy Living gets mentally fit for disasters
Disasters are likely to throw off balance the mental state of most persons. That is because it takes away the capacity to deal with problems during a stressful time. Earlier this month, a psychiatrist was in Belize to provide training on Mental Health. It’s an area that does not often get the needed attention, but that with assistance, persons affected can get back to normalcy. This segment of Healthy Living tackles this.
Marleni Cuellar, Reporting
At the start of June, all eyes are out in the Atlantic monitoring storm threats. Most organizations and a number of families have their hurricane plans in place. One key component in planning that is most often overlooked is that of Mental Health. Mental health is an integral aspect of preparing and responding to disasters. As visiting psychiatrist, Dr. Marc Laporta, pointed out the sudden and devastating impacts of a disaster affects the mental psyche of some people to recover.
Dr. Marc Laporta, Psychiatrist, Asst. Professor McGill University
dr mark laporta
“What a disaster does is that it takes out all that you expect to be able to rely upon. You don’t have it anymore; you don’t have your communities, you don’t have your families, you don’t have your work. That is what mental health basically is; it’s your ability to resolve problems so when you have your usual way to resolve problems disappears you have to find new ways to resolve problems.”
Dr. Laporta spent two days in Belize conducting training sessions on Mental Health in disasters. This is a key component of the Mental Health Disaster preparedness and response plan launched by the Ministry of Health. His experience in working with communities post disaster showed the other side of relief aid.
Dr. Marc Laporta
“The problem is that sometimes Ngo comes in—the Red Cross comes for a long time—many others come in for shorter periods of time and this causes a little bit of a problem because they offer a lot help, offer a lot hope and then they leave then there is a void there that is left and people are actually in a way more disorganized or a more helpless after than prior. One of the things that we talk a lot about is having something that is well rooted in the community so that even when the NGO’s come they have to be involved with the way the community is organized already.”
Hence the importance of having personnel trained in responding to mental health issues. The focus is in being able to rebuild communities and their problem solving abilities.
Dr. Marc Laporta
“We often look at things in phases and in the early phases we’re really looking at survival issues, making sure that people get food, they get water, they get shelter. You try to help people find their families and figure out what’s going on and help them get oriented with what’s going on. But very soon the mental health aspects comes in and that right away that people are overwhelmed, can’t think very clearly. And so this affects the capability to solve problems or even deal with the disaster. You’ve lost someone, there is physical loss, you’ve lost your house there is a physical loss you can’t drink there are physical consequences but the way we react to it is mental. So it’s always part of what’s going on at the same time. For a long time, talking about dealing with disasters has underestimated the role that mental health plays in making us able to deal with it. At a micro level, I think that what we learn is how important communities are. That’s the most important thing. We live within communities, to exaggerate a little bit, we don’t exist as individuals in many ways. We exist within our culture and within our communities. So it’s really important for communities to organize around these disasters.”
Dr. Laporta explains that while some erratic behavior may be expected, some people suffer longer lasting emotional struggles and that is where the need for assistance exists.
Dr. Marc Laporta
“You do expect people to be very stressed. You do expect people to go through at least an early period where they will be overwhelmed, where they may even feel hopeless and that is gonna last a period of time depending on how sever the disaster is and what the level of loss is. The problem is that after a while often what happens is that people begin to feel a little bit more hopeful, things start rebuilding, people have helped each other, they don’t feel alone and then they go through a period where they realize what really the loss is. And often it’s after that that you really are dealing with more depression and anxiety that’s a little more long term. The way we are made as human beings is that at one point we just fall back on our feet, our bodies wanna survive, our beings that we wanna survive in some way and we want to facilitate the minds ability to accept that also. It’s almost like the mind can also make things—our thinking gives us tools to resolve problems but it can also hinder our ability sometimes to resolve problems because we keep fixating on things so much that we can’t go forward.”
With the availability of psychological first aid, those persons affected can be allowed to recover to a sense of normalcy. Dr. Laporta also advises to discuss with children how to respond in emergencies offering practical advice, not vivifying worst case scenarios, so that they can feel equipped as well.
