EMDR treatment for survivor of earthquake disaster: Study case

Earthquake is a sudden disaster that happened without any previous warning. One of disaster was happened in Pangalengan district, West Java. Tectonic earthquake as strong as 7.3 Richter has happened on Sept 2th in 2009, which aroused significant impact on both mentally and physically. After 2 years since the traumatic event some people had PTSD symptoms. EMDR has proven in the treatment of PTSD. However, in Indonesia its application in handling PTSD of survivor is still limited. The objective of this research is to reduce PTSD symptoms and the change of positive psychological on the housewives of survivor earthquake by EMDR therapy. Using case study method, respondent in this research were two housewives of the survivor earthquake. Before and after therapy assessment was taken to find change of PTSD symptoms of the subjects by using PSS (PTSD Symptom Scale) and CAPS (Clinician Administered PTSD Scale). EMDR treatment was taken in four repetitive sessions. Each session was done in 60 – 90 minutes. This research concludes that all of subjects have reduced PTSD symptoms. After EMDR treatment, Subject A had changed from moderate to mild category of PTSD symptoms which is 23 point to 5 point for PSS score and subject B hadn’t changed moderate category but had changed on PSS score which is 34 to 19 point. This research also concludes that several factors influence success of EMDR treatment, such as: individual characteristic, positive response on therapy process, family support and family economic problem.

Conference

English

Eka Susanty

Susanty, E. (2014, January). EMDR treatment for survivor of earthquake disaster: Study case. In Early interventions, acute stress, manmade/natural disasters, burnout (Sombat Tapanya, Chair). Presentation at the 2nd EMDR Asia International Conference, Manila, The Philippines