Mental health service use one year after China 5.12 earthquake: Relationship with post-traumatic stress disorder among survivors

Abstract

Objective

To assess mental health service use after one year and to determine what kinds of people prefer to seek mental health (MH) care for mental or emotional problems? Is MH service helpful to moderate post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom? What are the relationships among potential traumatic events (PTEs) experiences, MH services utilization and PTSD symptoms?

Methods

A systematic random sample of 2300 people in 19 severely affected counties from the 5.12 Chinese earthquake was interviewed with a 90.4% response rate. The PTSD scale was based on the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition.

Results

There was a clear trend that the people who had a higher education level (OR = 2.952, P < 0.01**) and who had a higher monthly income (OR = 5.425, P < 0.01**) were more likely to seek MH services. The PTSD patients who had sought MH services and those who had not sought MH services were 182 and 653, respectively (29.8% of MH sample and 44.3% of non-MH sample).

Conclusions

MH services utilization was related to PTSD possibility decreasing. PTEs experiences were also related to MH services utilization and increased PTSD symptoms, so psychological intervention will continue to be an important aspect in post-disaster MH care.

Keywords:

• Mental health services
• China 5.12 earthquake
• post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms
• potential traumatic events

Acknowledgements

This research was supported by Major Bidding Program of National Social Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 08&ZD009) and also partially sponsored by the project of Investigation Propaganda Department of China Association for Science and Technology (Grant No. 2009DCYJ12). The authors are also grateful to Sichuan University for providing research funding (No. SKG2013001).

Declaration of Interest: The authors report no conflict of interest.