Steroid injection may reduce the risk of PTSD
A steroid injection that doctors used to give after a traumatic event may reduce the risk that the patient will later develop post-traumatic stress disorder. To such conclusion came researchers after a new study.
In the study, which involved 17 trauma patients, those who received injections of the steroid hormone cortisol during six hours of their injury were much less probable than those not given injections to develop PTSD some months later, the researchers said. They also assume that there can be an "opportunity" immediately following a trauma during which time of a measure can be undertaken to prevent PTSD.
“It is possible to think of it as a tablet from a hang-over for PTSD," says the study researcher Joseph Zohar of Tel Aviv University in Israel. Doctors name such precautions that are taken after the fact, such as the contraceptive pill ingested after sex, "secondary prevention maintenance."
He also added that if the findings will be confirmed, this will be the first time that there is secondary prevention in psychiatry.
Comments
(0)