Research suggests that survivors of the Maui wildfires face a long road of physical and cognitive challenges because of trauma and breathing in smoke particles.
“Indirectly exposed individuals, that is, those who lived in the community where the wildfire happened, were also affected by PTSD but to a lesser extent than directly exposed individuals,” she said.fled the Camp Fire with her cat, dog and bearded lizard hoping to find a quick exit by car. Instead, she was stuck in a massive traffic jam along Paradise’s Skyway as the fire raced uphill.
, senior research scientist in environmental health at the Chan school, who was not involved in the Camp Fire study. “In most cases, there is nothing they could have done.”The Camp Fire study also looked at cognitive functioning within six months to a year after the fire, using the, which measures the ability to suppress distractions while focusing on a task. They found a 20 percent deficit among those who had been exposed to wildfires compared with those who had not.
When the researchers looked at brain function underlying specific cognitive functions, they found heightened activity in the left frontal part of the brain that was more pronounced in those exposed to wildfires, she said.“It’s overprocessing all the stimuli coming at you,” Mishra said. “That’s what happens in traumatized brains.”
“Often people go into high gear in the immediate aftermath, where the need to get into survival mode is intense, and all systems are on high alert, and that can last for months,” she said. “But at some point, it is too much to sustain, and people crash, often around six months where they may sink into a deep depression.
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