Aim: After the Fukushima nuclear accident in 2011, several municipal offices were forced to evacuate, and municipal public employees (MPEs) had to perform many administrative tasks related to the disaster. Typhoons and the COVID-19 pandemic also affected the area afterwards. We conducted a survey for MPEs to investigate the mental health impacts and related factors.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFWe aimed to examine the support needs of women who migrated to Fukushima Prefecture after the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident. In recent years, the presence of migrants has become an important part of the government's reconstruction policy for affected areas. However, there is insufficient research on the status of migrants in these areas, and it is unclear what kind of support the migrants, especially females, require to encourage further migration to the area.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFStudies of recombinant adeno-associated virus (rAAV) revealed the mixture of full particles with different densities in rAAV. There are no conclusive results because of the lack of quantitative stoichiometric viral proteins, encapsidated DNA, and particle level analyses. We report the first comprehensive characterization of low- and high-density rAAV serotype 2 particles.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFObjective: Residents who lived near the Fukushima Power Plant accident were forced to change their lifestyle after the 2011 accident. This study aimed to elucidate the association of resident lifestyle and psychological factors with onset of hepatobiliary enzyme abnormalities (HEA) after the accident.
Methods: This longitudinal study included 15705 residents who underwent a comprehensive health check, as well as a mental health and lifestyle survey between June 2011 and March 2012.
The Great East Japan Earthquake occurred on 11 March 2011, forcing Fukushima Prefecture residents to change their living environment. Such sudden changes possibly have long-term effects on cardiovascular-related diseases. We therefore sought to identify temporal relationships between living environment changes and blood pressure levels over three years following the earthquake.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFEvacuees of the Great East Japan Earthquake have experienced adverse, long-term physical and psychological effects, including problem drinking. This study examined the risk and recovery factors for problem drinking among evacuees between fiscal years (FY) 2012 and 2017 using data on residents in the evacuation area from the Mental Health and Lifestyle Survey. With the FY 2012 survey as a baseline, a survey comprising 15,976 men and women was conducted in the evacuation area from FY 2013 to FY 2017, examining the risk and protective factors for problem drinking.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThe risk for people evacuated from Fukushima following the Great East Japan Earthquake of developing cancer from radiation exposure may be lower than that associated with smoking and alcohol drinking. However, the perception of those risks may change risk-related behavior. Therefore, we investigated whether the perceived risk of radiation exposure was associated with the initiation and/or cessation of smoking and of drinking alcohol following the disaster.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFBackground: The relationship between radiation levels and mental health status after a nuclear disaster is unknown. We examined the association between individual external radiation doses and psychological distress or post-traumatic stress after the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident in March 2011 in Japan.
Methods: The Mental Health and Lifestyle Survey was conducted from January 2012.
Int J Environ Res Public Health
November 2022
A novel healthy diet index for dietary quality can be used to assess food intake. After the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011, the Fukushima Health Management Survey collected dietary data using a short-form food frequency questionnaire (FFQ). The current study included eligible participants ( = 64,909) aged 16-84 years who answered the FFQ in 2011.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFInt J Environ Res Public Health
November 2022
The present study aimed to clarify the characteristics of young evacuees who had missed the Comprehensive Health Check of the Fukushima Health Management Survey (FHMS) after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011. The FHMS has been conducted as a prospective cohort study to evaluate the health status of evacuees annually after the great earthquake in 2011. This study focused on the annual participation rate in the Comprehensive Health Check of evacuees aged between 20 and 37 years in 2011 who evacuated due to the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant accident.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFDuring the Great East Japan Earthquake, many people experienced the loss of family and friends, among other traumatic events. This study sought to clarify the impact of the loss of significant close others on posttraumatic stress symptoms (PTSS), as well as the factors associated with PTSS, among individuals who experienced the loss of significant close others (i.e.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study examined whether disaster resilience affects the recovery of mental health states and mitigates psychosocial anxiety 10 years later the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident. The survey was conducted in Fukushima's evacuation-directed and non-evacuation-directed areas in January 2020. The 695 participants responded to a questionnaire including items on radiation-related anxiety regarding the Fukushima Daiichi accident, an action-oriented approach as a resilience factor, psychological distress, and demographic information.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNihon Koshu Eisei Zasshi
September 2022
Natural disasters force many evacuees to change several aspects of their lifestyles. This longitudinal study aimed to investigate whether factors such as living environment and lifestyle factors were related to new-onset hypertension in survivors of the Great East Japan Earthquake over a long-term follow-up of up to 7 years after the earthquake. The present study examined data collected from 29,025 Japanese participants aged 39-89 years, sourced from general health checkups and the Fukushima Mental Health and Lifestyle Survey, which was conducted in 13 communities between 2011 and 2018.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFThis study aimed to evaluate the sequential changes in the proportion of anemia among young women over eight years after the Great East Japan Earthquake in 2011 using a prospective study of the Fukushima Health Management Survey. This study focused on the women aged between 20 and 44 who lived in the evacuation area of the nuclear power plant accident. The yearly age-adjusted proportion of anemia was accessed with data between July 2011 and March 2019.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFPost-disaster mental health and psychosocial support have drawn attention in Japan after the 1995 Great Hanshin-Awaji Earthquake, with mental health care centers for the affected communities being organized. After the catastrophe, a reconstruction budget was allocated to organize mental health care centers to provide psychosocial support for communities affected by the 2007 Chūetsu offshore earthquake, the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake, and the 2016 Kumamoto Earthquake. There were several major improvements in post-disaster mental health measures after the Great East Japan Earthquake.
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