Message from the President:

As you are aware, 2005 was an unprecedented year for natural disasters with many areas of the world still grieving at the loss, pain and suffering of those directly involved in the earthquake and tsunamis in Indonesia and the Indian rim area, hurricanes in and around North America, the recent earthquake in the Hindu Kush mountain range of Pakistan, mudslides in Guatemala, and extreme weather in other regions.  The earth appears to be groaning and reacting under stress.   Many have been moved with compassion to reach out in some way to provide aid and recognize that the disaster relief efforts in these areas will be long and arduous. As part of the long-term response, there is a need for a global network of culturally indigenous, mental health support resources to provide psychological first aid and compassion fatigue support. Our research into past and current disaster relief efforts indicates that soon after the initial stabilization of medical and social relief efforts are in place, and the media attention tapers off, a long-term effort in dealing with the psychosocial effects of death, injury, grief and loss is necessary.


Remnants of a Buddhist temple near Batticaloa, Sri Lanka

However, the effort to provide psychological triage and support services is less organized globally than other relief interventions, and tends to be reactive rather than proactive.  Furthermore, to be effective, psychological first aid must be culturally sensitive and relevant.  We realize that Western psychology is not always relevant or appropriate in many regions of the world.  We are also keenly aware that collaboration between agencies with similar objectives is crucial to provide the highest quality relief services.


The remnants of Hurricane Katrina in Biloxi, Mississippi

While the global community clearly recognizes the immediate need for primary disaster interventions and first responders (acute medical relief and basic needs), there is currently a great need for an equally well-organized psychological support system to be in place for survivors of natural and man-made disasters and the caregivers and volunteers involved in the relief effort and reconstruction.  PsyCorps has been established to directly answer that need.

Many relief organizations seek to provide direct service to survivors of disaster, but it is PsyCorps’ goal to help disaster-prone regions develop their own teams to provide psychological support for natural and man-made disaster survivors and caregivers. The vision of PsyCorps is to create a global community of culturally indigenous psychological support teams that are inter-connected and prepared beforehand to respond to the acute and long-term psychological effects of disaster survivors.

Photo: Reuters

The PsyCorps model offers a flexible paradigm to provide psychological first aid interventions. PsyCorps emphasizes a strength-based approach that promotes the development of resiliency, positive coping skills and capacity building. Recent research in the area of psychological first aid has shown that this type of crisis intervention is often the most effective in assisting disaster victims and caregivers, and preventing the development of more significant mental health disorders. Our interest is to empower local regions towards setting up, developing and training culturally indigenous teams. Our objective is for this to be a collaborative effort especially as it relates to the cross-cultural applications of providing psychological support. Our goal is for psychological support teams to be set in place in a designated region, organized, prepared and ready for mobilization to address the psychosocial aspects emerging from disaster relief and reconstruction work, targeting survivors, first responders and caregivers.


Young tsunami survivors learning to live again

Please join us in our pursuit of an organized, prepared network of psychological support teams.  For more specific information or ideas about the vision and purpose of PsyCorps, please feel free to contact me at ggoodwin@psycorps.us

Glenn T. Goodwin, PhD, DABFE, DABPS, FABMPP Founder/President