12 - Debriefing post disaster: follow-up after a major earthquake

Summary

EDITORIAL COMMENTS

Kenardy and Carr review experience of debriefing as reported by participants in a community-based study following an earthquake in Newcastle, New South Wales. They also review other work such as that of Mitchell's group, Watt's studies and other research. They note that the perceptions of helpfulness as described in Watt's work are nevertheless frequently uncorrelated with outcome - or, as Ørner has more recently reported, debriefing appears to be perceived as helpful by those who seem to need it least.

The issue of expectancy that debriefing will be beneficial is important, and needs to be addressed in any critical review of debriefing and its potential effectiveness. The authors note that their study was not originally designed as an empirical test of debriefing, but rather was a naturalistic opportunity to incorporate systematic questions into their investigation of the consequences of the earthquake and to explore specifically issues for professional and volunteer disaster workers. Their study evaluated and compared individuals (helpers) who reported having been debriefed with those helpers who did not experience debriefing but were equivalent in terms of personal threat experience and levels of stress in ‘helping’ roles, as well as working in dangerous settings. The debriefed group was composed of more ‘counsellors’ and more women. Their findings report that 80% found debriefing helpful, but outcomes (measured by the Impact of Event Scale and the General Health Questionnaires) were no different, nor was rate of recovery.