At the start of the spread of the new coronavirus infection, the disaster medical team provided mental and physical care to people who were quarantined on the Diamond Princess in the port of Yokohama.This time, a research group consisting of the University of Tsukuba, the Graduate School of Hiroshima University, and the Ministry of Health, Labor and Welfare commissioned project DPAT Secretariat analyzed the mental states and effective care of passengers and crew at this time, using support data.Many of them were found to have improved with the support.
From February 2020 to 2, 5, the cruise ship Diamond Princess underwent quarantine at the port of Yokohama, with 23 passengers and crew from 56 countries quarantined on board for 3,711 days.During that time, the Disaster Psychiatric Assistance Team (DPAT) will be onboard to carry out mental health support activities.So far, there have been no sufficient examples of quarantine-related mental health problems and no support has been established.Therefore, the research group used the data from the DPAT team's daily report system (J-SPEED) to evaluate the clinical characteristics and care details of the people who received support.
Of the 3,711 passengers and crew, 206 received physical assistance and 127 received emotional assistance during the quarantine period.Physically, fever, disaster stress-related symptoms, and acute respiratory infection were the most common.On the mental side, anxiety, an acute stress reaction to the quarantine situation, was the most common, followed by insomnia, other symptoms, depression, anger, and suicidal ideation.Also, while women and crew most frequently needed mental health support, many improved after a single session of listening and counseling.
This research has revealed that in addition to physical health support, mental health support is essential to protect the lives of passengers and crew when a disaster such as an infectious disease occurs in a special environment such as a ship. .Findings like this will help us deal with future quarantines, shipping accidents and psychological crises.
