As life slowly returns to normal in Fort McMurray, many residents are still struggling to cope with the mental health aftershock of last year’s devastating blaze.
Requests for mental health support in Fort McMurray spiked nearly 3,000 per cent last year, according to local psychiatrist Vincent Agyapong. More than 29,000 requests were made in 2016, a massive leap from the average 1,000 requests per year.
Those requests have strained the community’s limited number of psychiatrists. Alberta Health Services has hired two general psychiatrists to help reach those who need help this summer.
But Fort McMurray still has no child psychiatrist -- leaving school counsellors, community social workers and telehealth services to meet the unique needs of young people.
“If you’ve been to Fort McMurray and you’ve seen whole neighbourhoods destroyed by the fire, you would understand this would be very traumatic,” Agyapong told CTV Edmonton.
Agyapong, who lives in Fort McMurray and fled the wildfire last summer, has been researching how memories of the fire affected a sample group of 500 residents. Of the group, 13 per cent have been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and 14 per cent have major depression.
“It’s not surprising, given the scale of the devastation,” he said.
Sandra Legacy fled her home in Abasand last year. Months later, she says she was diagnosed with PTSD.
“Closing my eyes at the very beginning, all I could see was flames. It took quite a long time before I got the smell of smoke out of my nostrils, and then my brain,” Legacy said. “Everybody is looking for the new normal.”
The next phase of Agyapong’s research will focus on young people recovering from the fire.
For children, warning signs of mental health issues can be difficult to detect. Erin Delong worried about the impact the fire had on her four-year-old daughter.
“The thought of an emergency happening again … I just wanted to be with her as much as I could be,” said Delong, who has moved into a new home in Fort McMurray.
More than 800,000 Canadians are estimated to have PTSD. Patients with PTSD can relive memories of trauma, struggle to sleep and become fearful despite no apparent risk. It can lead to higher rates of alcohol abuse, hospitalization and suicide.
Major depression, or clinical depression, is marked by feelings of guilt and helplessness, change in weight, decreased energy and poor concentration. According to a 2012 Statistics Canada survey, nearly 5 per cent of Canadians older than 15 reported symptoms of major depression during the year before the study.
Last month, a preliminary study from the University of Alberta suggested that one in five firefighters who attended the Fort McMurray fire have respiratory problems and one in six have been diagnosed with depression or anxiety.
For a full list of public mental health resources in Fort McMurray, click here.
With a report from CTV Edmonton’s Shanelle Kaul
