Health-Related Rehabilitation after the 2008 Great Wenchuan Earthquake in China: A Ten Year Retrospective Systematic Review

Being one of the world’s seismically hazard-prone countries, the People’s Republic of China (PRC) witnessed an 8.0-magnitude earthquake on May 12th 2008—which was reported as one of the most destructive disasters since its founding. Following this earthquake, rehabilitation was greatly required for survivors to enable them to achieve and maintain optimal independence; functioning; full physical, mental and social ability; inclusion; and participation in all aspects of life and environments. We conducted a systematic review based on Preferred Reporting Items for Systematic Reviews and Meta-Analyses (PRISMA) guidelines to retrospectively identify, in five English databases/sources, the existing evidence about the Health-Related Rehabilitation (HRR) that was rendered to the survivors of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake between 2008 and 2018. Only 11 studies out of 828 initial studies retrieved were included in our study and reported the survivors of the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake to have been aged between 10.5 and 55.7, and predominantly diagnosed with posttraumatic stress disorders. Their HRR was mainly premised on physical and physiological therapies, as well as traditional Chinese medicine and digital technologies. Although all HRR interventions used were reported to be effective, none was identified as much more effective than the others in the post-earthquake era —which calls for more robust research to build upon our systematic review.