The impact of serving in disaster relief among volunteers in Malaysia

PURPOSE: Malaysian disaster relief volunteers have a long and proud history of participating in relief missions within and outside the country. Despite of a plethora of researches into the various areas of disaster relief, there has been a little scholarly activity looking into the experiences of the medical volunteers worldwide and even less research on the experiences of the relief volunteers in Malaysia. Therefore, the purpose of this study is to identify the effect of disaster relief works on volunteers in Malaysia.

METHODS: This is a non-experimental cross-sectional design study, which was conducted using survey questionnaire to examine the incidence of burnout, posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms and the quality of life (QOL) among the disaster relief volunteers. And the study also examined the socio-demographic variables of the participants. In addition, the association between the sociodemographic variable and the preferred coping strategies was also investigated through self-reporting checklist.

RESULTS: The findings of this study revealed that 90.9% volunteers (n = 312) experienced some levels of recurring stress throughout their lives, which led to burnout. Also, 96.8% (n = 332) of the participants were categorized as having at least some symptoms of PTSD. However, self-reporting QOL measurements indicated that the participants are, in general, satisfied with their lives. Significant associations between the incidence of burnout, incidence of PTSD and QOL were identified. Both positive coping measures and behavioral or avoidant coping measures were also identified. Furthermore, a number of socio-demographic factors were also seen to interact significantly with burnout, PTSD and QOL.

CONCLUSION: This study provides some insights into the psychological challenges of disaster relief volunteers in Malaysia, and this impact can last a long time after the volunteers return to their hometowns. Several recommendations including practice development, policy and research were discussed in the study.