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. 2011 Oct;24(5):557-65.
doi: 10.1002/jts.20684. Epub 2011 Sep 6.

Peritraumatic and trait dissociation differentiate police officers with resilient versus symptomatic trajectories of posttraumatic stress symptoms

Isaac R Galatzer-Levy  1 , Anita Madan, Thomas C Neylan, Clare Henn-Haase, Charles R Marmar
Affiliations

Peritraumatic and trait dissociation differentiate police officers with resilient versus symptomatic trajectories of posttraumatic stress symptoms

Isaac R Galatzer-Levy et al. J Trauma Stress. 2011 Oct.

Abstract

Research has consistently demonstrated that stress reactions to potentially traumatic events do not represent a unified phenomenon. Instead, individuals tend to cluster into prototypical response patterns over time including chronic symptoms, recovery, and resilience. We examined heterogeneity in a posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptom course in a sample of 178 active-duty police officers following exposure to a life-threatening event using latent growth mixture modeling (LGMM). This analysis revealed 3 discrete PTSD symptom trajectories: resilient (88%), distressed-improving (10%), and distressed-worsening (2%). We further examined whether trait and peritraumatic dissociation distinguished these symptom trajectories. Findings indicate that trait and peritraumatic dissociation differentiated the resilient from the distressed-improving trajectory (trait, p < .05; peritraumatic, p < .001), but only peritraumatic dissociation differentiated the resilient from the distressed-worsening trajectory (p < .001). It is essential to explore heterogeneity in symptom course and its predictors among active-duty police officers, a repeatedly exposed group. These findings suggest that police officers may be a highly resilient group overall. Furthermore, though there is abundant evidence that dissociation has a positive linear relationship with PTSD symptoms, this study demonstrates that degree of dissociation can distinguish between resilient and symptomatic groups of individuals.

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Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
A 3-class unconditional model for modified PTSD Checklist (PCL-M) scores for 178 police officers exposed to life threat.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

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