Post-disaster quality of life among older survivors five years after the Bam earthquake: implications for recovery policy

Ali Ardalan · Monir Mazaheri · Michael J. VanRooyen · Hani O. Mowafi · Saharnaz Nedjat · K Holakouie Naieni +1 more

77 citations0/0 files storedAgeing and Society

No readable copy stored yet — this record is metadata only.

No open-access location is known for this record yet.

Literature note Cite in a project Citation map

Earthquake and Disaster Impact Studies Disaster Management and Resilience Disaster Response and Management

Abstract

ABSTRACT Older people are among the most vulnerable in major disasters. In their aftermath, it is crucial to institute efforts that will maintain a high level of elders' quality of life (QoL). This paper presents QoL assessments of elderly survivors five years after the Bam earthquake in Iran, and evaluates the determinants. A cross-sectional analysis of 210 randomly-selected survivors was carried out in 2008 using the WHOQOL-BREF questionnaire. A comparison of the results with data on the general population showed that experiencing the earthquake may adversely affect psychological dimensions of QoL even five years after, but paradoxically the earthquake resulted in better social relationships in affected communities than in the general population. Lower QoL associated with female gender, higher age, living alone, severe earthquake-related injury, poor quality of living conditions, increased dependency in the activities of daily living, living in an urban area, and being temporarily housed. Recovery experts and donors should carry out long-term monitoring of health status and QoL in disaster-affected communities, with a focus on psychological wellbeing. Intervention programmes that emphasise post-disaster quality of care and satisfactory housing may lead to better QoL of the victims and may shorten the recovery phase.

Paper brief

Loading…

Cite this work

Citation unavailable for this work.

BibTeX RIS CSL-JSON

No public copy is stored for this record, so only the metadata is cited.

Citations in this library

Citation map →

Stored only when both papers are in the corpus — 77 citations exist upstream.

References

2007The relationship between gender, social support, and health-related quality of life in a community-based study in Washington County, Maryland 2002The impact of the Chi-Chi earthquake on quality of life among elderly survivors in Taiwan – A before and after study 2007Earthquake survivors' quality of life and academic achievement six years after the earthquakes in Marmara, Turkey

Cited by

2018How will the sustainable development goals deliver changes in well-being? A systematic review and meta-analysis to investigate whether WHOQOL-BREF scores respond to change 2015Trust in Chinese Government and Quality of Life (QOL) of Sichuan Earthquake Survivors: Does Trust in Government Help to Promote QOL?2020Quality of life and quality of environment in Czechia in the period of the COVID-19 pandemic 2013Participatory and evidence‐based recommendations for urban redevelopment following natural disasters: Older adults as policy advisers 2020Social capital, policy fairness, and subjective life satisfaction of earthquake survivors in Wenchuan, China: a longitudinal study based on post-earthquake survey data 2015Prospective study of predictors of poor self-rated health in a 23-year cohort of earthquake survivors in Armenia 2015Adaptation of the elderly in shelters and temporary housing after the Great East Japan Earthquake: A focus on the interaction with their living environments

Explore the map →

Papers that cite the same references — the relational fallback while embeddings are still backfilling.

Imported from OpenAlex (CC0) — nothing here is generated.