Hurricane Andrew Ptsd Case Study

In 1992, hurricane Andrew was a category four hurricane and said to be one of the worst natural disasters to happen in the United States at the time. It’s winds surpassed 160 miles per hour and caused damage to over 125,000 homes within 400 square miles. Hurricane Andrew left approximately 175,000 families and children temporarily homeless.
It is believed that the trauma caused from hurricane Andrew has led to post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in many children who had to endure this natural disaster. These children would have gruesome thought or dreams allow them to relive the moments of the disaster.
A few months after hurricane Andrew, a survey of 568 children were conducted. There was a high amount of PTSD symptoms. Out of these roughly 170 of these children were described to have severe or very severe levels of PTSD.

Roughly 340 of these children feared and believed that they might have died during the storm.

However, it is uncertain the time span of PTSD in children following the natural disaster.
The concept on anticipating how children reacted to these natural disasters is as follows:
Child’s characteristics prior to traumatic experience. This may include ethnicity or essential qualities.

How the child is exposed to this event.

Did it threaten their life or the life of others close to them? What type of loss happened afterwards?
The child’s efforts put forth to process and deal with events in the disaster. Do they blame themselves or deal with it in a positive manner?
The environment after the disaster to include major life events. The support received whether or not it is social support from family members, friends, teachers, classmates or whomever might have been close to the child.
The first determinant is a critical state. It is based on the child’s exposure towards this traumatic

experience
The second is child’s demographics. Studies shown, that females as well as African Americans were more likely to be more distressful after a natural disaster. This was based on factors of gender and other ethnicities to include Caucasian or other minorities.
The third determinant was the recovery process. This includes the support received. It was to determine specifically what type of social support was given. Those that fewer support reported to have higher PTSD symptoms shortly after the event.
The fourth determinant was the child’s way of handling the situation during post disaster recovery environment. This may include the types of shelters sought after event. This step is how the child processed the events and was able to deal with ho life continued after.
The last determinants were disturbing events that happened post hurricane. This event can also be seen as death of a family member or parents being divorced. This may have increased children stress level.