Psychosocial Impact of Koshi Flood among Survivors in West Kusaha VDC of Sunsari, Nepal

Khatiwada S, Shah T, Niraula S R, Lama S R
2019 International Journal of Nursing Research and Practice (IJNRP)  
Floods are the most common hazard to cause disasters and have led to extensive morbidity and mortality throughout the world. Nepal suffers from many kinds of natural disasters, of which the most common and serious one is flooding. Long and heavy rainfall in 2008 resulted in a devastating flood. It caused a substantial health impact on residents in and around the Sunsari District. Natural disasters, like flooding, have been reported to cause a wide range of psychosocial impacts, leading the
more » ... ms to present psychiatric disorder. Objectives: The aim of this study is to assess the psychosocial impact of flood among severely affected victims from flood in West Kusaha Sunsari district. Methodology: A descriptive cross-sectional study was carried out among 127 households in 3 selected Village Development committee which is heavily flood affected. Participants were interviewed and information collected on the psychosocial impacts of the devastation after the flood using standard tools and questionnaire. Results: In this study 98 respondents were male and 29 were female. More than one-third of respondents were between ages 41-50, mean age of the respondents was 46.58 ± SD 12.46 years. Finding shows that majority of respondents have GHQ Score > 3 which indicates psychological morbidity. More than half of respondents have mild to severe anxiety and more than half of the respondents have mild to severe depression. Regarding social support quite higher in age between 20-40 years, joint family members and people remain above poverty line. Conclusion: There is some impact of flood among survivors as they had different level of depression, anxiety.
doi:10.15509/ijnrp.2019.6.1.368 fatcat:se73qoe4bzc4ve6sgu62czuptm