ARQ National Psychotrauma Centre

Background and objectives: A rise in prolonged grief disorder (PGD) levels was expected due to COVID-19 deaths. We tested this assumption, by comparing PGD-severity among people who experienced a death of a loved one during the pandemic caused by a natural (e.g., illness), COVID-19, or unnatural (e.g., accidents, suicides, homicides) loss on average 8 months earlier and in a subgroup of people bereaved ≥12 months earlier.

Background and objectives: Savoring beliefs refer to people’s beliefs about their ability to generate, increase, and prolong enjoyment from positive experiences. The role of these beliefs in affecting responses to negative events is largely unexplored. This study aimed to increase
knowledge about the role of savoring beliefs in symptoms of posttraumatic stress (PTS) following negative life events and the incremental role of these beliefs beyond the impact of worry, depressive rumination, and neuroticism.

This study provided a detailed description of the experiences of 60 treatment-seeking children and young people following parental intimate partner homicide (PIPH) in the United Kingdom, and evaluated the potential effectiveness of the traumatic grief focused cognitive behavioral therapy they received.

Sexually assaulted women represent a particularly high-risk group for developing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Potentially traumatic events (PTEs) and peritraumatic dissociation (PD) are known risk factors for PTSD. However, little is known about how previous trauma affects PD and how this relationship affects PTSD. We aimed to investigate whether PD acts as a mediator between PTEs and PTSD severity in a sample of recently sexually assaulted women in Sao Paulo, Brazil.

Prolonged grief disorder, a condition characterized by severe, persistent, and disabling grief, is newly included in ICD-11 and DSM-5-TR. Prolonged grief symptoms can be effectively treated with face-to-face or internet-delivered cognitive behavioral therapy. Traumatic losses may elicit higher prevalence of severe grief reactions. While face-to-face cognitive behavioral therapy appears efficacious in treating prolonged grief symptoms in traumatically bereaved individuals, it is not yet clear if internet-based cognitive behavioral therapy is efficacious for this population.

Background: Exposure to adversity in utero is thought to increase susceptibility to develop posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following later life trauma, due to neurobiological programming effects during critical developmental periods. It remains unknown whether effects of prenatal adversity on PTSD susceptibility are modulated by genetic variations in neurobiological pathways implicated in PTSD susceptibility.

This chapter focuses on the mental vulnerability of traumatic grief and recovery with this vulnerability, which implies a reduction in the number or intensity of symptoms or distress. Grief is characterized by an ambiguous presence-in-absence of the deceased, involving existential concerns such as isolation and meaninglessness.

Purpose of Review

Women are twice as likely to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) compared to men after a traumatic experience. The purpose of this mini review was to explore recent research on biological contributors to this sex difference.

Recent Findings

Purpose of Review
Women are twice as likely to develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) compared to men after a traumatic experience. The purpose of this mini review was to explore recent research on biological contributors to this sex difference.

Background
Most staff stay healthy during humanitarian work, although some worsen. Mean scores on health indicators may be masking individual participants struggling with health issues.

Aims

To investigate different field assignment-related health trajectories among international humanitarian aid workers (iHAWs) and explore the mechanisms used to stay healthy.

Method

Growth mixture modelling analyses for five health indicators using pre-/post-assignment and follow-up data.