Social Services Staff Found to Experience Mental Health Problems a Year After Mass Shooting

In a neighborhood where a mass shooting had occurred less than a year before, one-third of social services staff screened positive for mental health disorders, according to astudy published inJAMA Network Open.Eleven months after the shooting at the Tree of Life synagogue on October 27, 2018, in Pittsburgh, Rafael J. Engel, Ph.D., of the University of Pittsburgh and colleagues reached out to nonprofit organizations in the synagogue ’s neighborhood. Eight executives of the social service agencies and educational institutions emailed surveys to their staffs aimed at measuring mental health symptoms , comprising 374 individuals.The survey screened for depression, suicidal ideation, generalized anxiety disorder, posttraumatic stress disorder, alcohol misuse, marijuana use, and drug use for nonmedical reasons. Among the screening measures used were the Patient Health Questionnaire-2, Generalized Anxiety Disorder-7, and Primary Care for PTSD Screen forDSM-5.Of the 167 staff members who completed the online survey, 33.3% screened positive for at least one of the mental health disorders.24.4% screened positive for alcohol misuse21.8% screened positive for marijuana use19.9% screened positive for posttraumatic stress disorder19.2% screened positive for generalized anxiety disorder10.9% screened positive for depression9.6% screened positive for suicidal ideation9% screened positive for nonmedical drug use.There was no statistically significant difference between the partici...
Source: Psychiatr News - Category: Psychiatry Tags: anxiety depression gun violence JAMA Network Open mass shooting posttraumatic stress disorder Rafael Engel substance use disorder suicidal ideation Tree of Life synagogue Source Type: research