PTSD Outcome, Adjustment Disorder and Methods of Treatment

This research is pointed up on “Adjustment disorder and adaptation with anxiety, stress and depression following the catastrophic life events”. We explained the results of psychopathological and psychosocial effects of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), especially depression and anxiety caused by catastrophic stressful life events or other factors (war, terrorist acts, etc.), and then discussed and presented different methods and forms of treatments. Our theoretical studies, in the fields of PTSD-Psychogeriatry and Psychiatry in one side and different Seminars in Paris etc. in other side, have completed this research; the studies at the University of Illinois, as full time Prof. are developed in this working research. Anxiety disorders, depression and stresses are not a new phenomenon in the field of psychiatry, they have existed several years B.C., but their aetiology and physiopathology were not clear. Moreover, the treatments were on the basis of some medical plants or traditional and local methods which existed yet, more or less in some African or Asiatic countries, the hospitals for mental disorders had been limited; in plus, environmental factors, also heredity, quality of life and the degree of the vulnerability of individuals and the capacity of the patients to cope with the pain. etc were neglected. In our time, because of multifactorial reasons, anxiety disorders and depression, which are often accompanied by obsessive-compulsive disorders, are the most prevalent pathology in Psychiatry that we discussed in this paper (Figure 1). Actually, because of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the frequency of depression and anxiety disorders, according to the global news and audio-visual information, are significantly increased. Our teaching experiences, also clinical researches and observations in the Mental Health Centres showed clearly that in extreme cases when major depression and anxiety are accumulating and occur to coexist together, they can exert serious pathological effects not only on the cardiovascular system and endocrine glands but also on the cognitive system more particularly on flexibility, memory, creativity and attention (Figure 2); moreover, the coexistence of anxiety and a psychiatric condition can produce not only cognitive disorder, but in some cases - ex. inability to cope with pain or inadaptability to stress, may hasten and intensify ageing process. In many cases as shown, the anxious subjects, when confronted to psychosocial crisis, feel fear and expect to be facing to adverse events or catastrophic situations and believe to live negative future events; in plus, exhibit emotional distress, repetitive dreams and severe insomnia. In these cases, according to our experiences, in parallel to pharmacotherapy, the relaxation and complete massages in one side, physical education, meditation, positive emotion and muscular release etc. in other side, are useful to help these patients for a best control of emotional distress and relatively reduce anxiety and depression. We add that the syndrome of stress, depression and anxiety has been recognized not only in the different victims of war, but also in the non-war (cf. other factors noted in this paper: fig. 1) traumatized population.