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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
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The 130th Annual Meeting of APHA |
John Kastan, PhD, Behavioral Health Services, Saint Vincent Catholic Medical Centers, 203 West 12th St., 6th Floor, New York, NY 10011, Roy H. Lubit, Department of Psychiatry, Saint Vincents Hospital, 140 West 12th Street, Reiss Pavilion, New York, NY 10011, and Barry Rock, Graduate School of Social Service, Fordham University, 113 West 60th Street, New York, NY 10023, 212 636 6653, jkastan@saintvincentsnyc.org.
This presentation will examine organizational obstacles to providing mental health services following the 9/11 disaster. Community disasters cause tremendous short and long term needs for mental health services. In NYC an estimated 100,000 have PTSD and 100,000 have depression. More destructive to our community than even the immediate pain of PTSD and depression is the long-term impact on the development of children: impaired ability to develop crucial skills; impaired moral development; increased vulnerability to future trauma;and, development of problematic cognitions about the world. Some have voiced concern about the inadequate size of the mental health infrastructure to deal with these issues. In reality, bureaucratic and political obstacles to providing needed treatment are more serious obstacles.Thousands volunteered, but there was no quality control and little infrastructure to credential and allocate resources. Ineffective and potentially damaging therapies were provided at times. Competition between various service providers interfered with getting services to those who needed them. Organizations hesitated in letting any outsiders in to provide services, and became grid locked over who to let in and what to let them do. The findings will be presented of a descriptive, qualitative study using interviews with significant informants in the relevant organizations, and data from a number of public and private sources, including public agencies, newspapers, trade assocations, and the central triage medical center closest to the World Trade Center disaster. The research is expected to yield insights into organizational functioning and crisis behavior that will have both theoretical interest and direct application to disaster preparation and response.
Learning Objectives:
Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.