Tonic immobility is associated with posttraumatic stress symptoms in healthcare professionals exposed to COVID-19-related trauma.
J Anxiety Disord
; 90: 102604, 2022 08.
Article
in English
| MEDLINE | ID: covidwho-1983340
ABSTRACT
The Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic has exposed healthcare workers (HCW) to traumatic situations that might lead to the development of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). An important vulnerability factor for PTSD is the peritraumatic tonic immobility (TI) reaction, an involuntary and reflexive defensive response evoked by an intense and inescapable threat. TI is largely understudied in humans and has not been investigated during trauma related to COVID-19. For HCW, the pandemic context might be experienced as an intense and potentially inescapable threat, i.e., an overwhelming situation. Here, we investigated if TI response occurred during traumatic events related to the pandemic and its association with posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS). An online survey of 1001 HCW investigated COVID-19-related traumatic experiences, TI and PTSS. TI was reported for all types of traumatic events, and multivariate regression models revealed that TI was significantly associated with PTSS severity. HCW who reported high TI scores exhibited an increase of 9.08 times the probability of having a probable diagnosis of PTSD. Thus, TI was evoked by pandemic-related traumatic situations and associated with PTSS severity and higher odds of a PTSD diagnosis. Tonic immobility occurrence should be screened, and psychoeducation about its reflexive biological nature should be introduced.
Keywords
Full text:
Available
Collection:
International databases
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Stress Disorders, Post-Traumatic
/
COVID-19
Type of study:
Diagnostic study
/
Observational study
/
Prognostic study
/
Qualitative research
Topics:
Long Covid
Limits:
Humans
Language:
English
Journal:
J Anxiety Disord
Journal subject:
Psychiatry
Year:
2022
Document Type:
Article
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