Scotland takes action on treating combat PTSD

NHS enlists expert war trauma doctors
EDDIE BARNES
POLITICAL EDITOR (ebarnes@scotlandonsunday.com)
MILITARY doctors will work within the NHS to stop the scandal of war heroes being left to cope on their own with crushing mental health illnesses.

The groundbreaking move by the Ministry of Defence is a major victory for campaigners after doctors slammed the treatment being meted out to ex-soldiers, claiming they were being were being dealt with in the same way as "a postman or a painter".

A treatment scheme will be piloted in Edinburgh under which military psychiatrists will be brought into hospital to ensure the trauma suffered by ex-servicemen is dealt with properly.

Veterans minister Derek Twigg told Scotland on Sunday that he had reached a deal with the Scottish Government to fund the new unit which will be open to all veterans needing help.
go here for the rest
http://news.scotsman.com/uk.cfm?id=1755252007

PTSD notes:Fort Carson reaching out to the community for help

Help for soldiers outside Ft. Carson

The army is asking for help dealing with soldiers who are struggling with emotional issues. Leaders on Fort Carson announced, on Friday, an outreach program aimed at finding more help for soldiers and their families dealing with mental health issues. It's called the Warrior and Family Community Partnership.

When the 2nd Brigade began returning home to Fort Carson a few years ago, a new issue came to light. They saw more soldiers suffering from post traumatic stress, and traumatic brain injury.

Fort Carson leaders admit they weren't prepared for what they saw. Now, they're arming for the next wave of incoming soldiers.

Major General Mark Graham says, "We expect a surge when they come back in needed care."
He says the mental health issues facing our soldiers has outgrown the gates of Fort Carson.
go here for the rest
http://www.koaa.com/news/view.asp?ID=9252

News report video
http://www.koaa.com/video/news/index.asp?cat=news&id=9252

New Video pokes fun at suicide

It really is sickening what some people think is funny. This video is about a young man after a failed suicide attempt. His "best friend" comes to visit him and complains. Not about the fact his best friend tried to kill himself, but because his suicide note was filled with grammatical errors. It turns out his biggest complaint was that he was not given anything in the note. He hands his friend a new piece of paper and a different color pen so that his pal can get started on a new suicide note.

This is supposed to be funny? I wonder what the people at Crooked Mouth could have done if they tried to do something helpful for people finding themselves so lost they try to commit suicide or for the families left behind those who succeeded at it? I'm sure they will enjoy a large group of people watching this video and laughing without one single thought about the expense other people will pay for this dark attempt at humor.
Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com

I hate to put up the link to this piece but I doubt anyone would belive there are people out there thinking suicide is funny. This offers nothing to seeking a solution, a helpful suggestion or anything to people suffering.

Suicide Note (User Video)
Next time get it right.
- Newest - Video Clips - http://www.ifilm.com

Warning about Paxil and Seroxat

We really have to wonder if some of the suicides are linked to the medication they are given.

According to a Norwegian study, adults taking the antidepressant drug paroxetine are at a higher risk of attempting to commit suicide than those not taking medication.
In this new analysis, of previous clinical data on paroxetine use, the antidepressant is added to the list of Selective Serotonin Reuptake Inhibitors (SSRIs) that have been shown to increase suicidal tendencies in adult patients with depression.

In their study Ivar Aursnes and colleagues from the University of Oslo, Norway, re-examined data from 16 selected paroxetine trials, in which patients diagnosed with depression had been randomly given either paroxetine or a placebo drug.

Neither the participants nor the researchers conducting the initial studies knew what the participants had been given.

Aursnes and his team did a statistical analysis of the results of these studies, in order to evaluate the incidence of suicide attempts in both groups.

Their work took into account the amount of time the participants had been exposed to paroxetine, and their results discovered that there were seven suicide attempts in the group on paroxetine, but only one among the patients on the placebo.

Although it is recognised that Paroxetine can increase suicidal attempt rates in children and teenagers, previous studies have failed to reach a conclusion regarding the effects of the drug on suicide attempt rates in adult patients.

Way back in February this year, David Gunnell of Bristol University and colleagues, warned doctors about an increased risk of suicidal behaviour in patients treated with SSRIs.
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Paroxetine (Paxil, Seroxat) is a selective serotonin reuptake inhibitor (SSRI) antidepressant. It was released in 1992 by the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline. In 2006 it was the fifth-most prescribed antidepressant in the United States retail market, with more than 19.7 million prescriptions.[1] The prescription of this drug is controversial because of side effects such as suicidal ideation and withdrawal syndrome which have resulted in legal proceedings against the manufacturer.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paroxetine

Be part of the solution of PTSD or get out of the way

I received an email today asking me what my agenda was. Not sure what they meant, I wrote back asking the sender to clarify it. I got back a nasty email in return. It is one I won't be answering, but will address it here. His email is blocked.

My agenda is to make sure that every single person in this country and around the world, not only knows what PTSD is, but that the help they need is there for them. This is especially important to be with veterans, police, fire fighters and all emergency responders because they put themselves between trauma and other victims by their willingness. We think of them all as heroes but we fail to see how human they all are. We know we need them, but then we can't figure out why they would ever need help.

The emailer wrote that I was causing problems for other veterans who do not have PTSD as if there is something to be ashamed of, or that those who do have PTSD should just suffer in silence to not "make the others look bad" as if they are all "damaged" goods, among a long list of other rants. Ignorance will not be tolerated by me and should not be tolerated by anyone. Asking questions, trying to learn and understand what the media is finally focusing on should always be regarded with patience and those of us dealing with this kind of work, should always be mindful of the difference between them and someone attacking others. It is for this reason this post comes long past due.

There are a lot of people in this country dismissing PTSD as if they are so much better than to ever be a "coward" or "lazy" or "sucking off the system" to ever need help. Others regard anyone filing a claim for disability as one who is looking for a free ride the rest of their life. What I've found is there are two types of the deniers of PTSD. One, is denying they have it themselves. The other type thinks that everyone in the world is out to get something from them. Be it their portion of the tax dollars they pay, or their own twisted sense of pride in themselves. People tend to dismiss things and then don't even waste their time reading about it, discussing it or posting about it. They certainly don't waste their time firing off a couple of pages worth of an email rage.

The deniers who have PTSD will most likely email several times and questions come as attacks fade. Yet those who fall into the other category are people no one will ever reach and that's a shame. They will never know what they have done to others unless it happens to someone they not only know, but admire as well. Then it will be personal to them. Until that day comes, if it ever does, they will stand in the way to make sure no one gets anything they do not have. If they have to work for a living, no one should be able to be supported no matter how serious their wounds or how damaged their minds are. It doesn't matter how much suffering they go through or the families falling apart over this. They will come up with excuses until they run out of air. The only thing I can suggest is avoid them. You are wasting your time when you come into contact with people like that.

We, on this side, need to remain focused on the work ahead. There is too little time to reach everyone needing help and for all the time we take with people who will not even open up their minds, we lose time we could be spending with those in the most need. Take this as an experienced suggestion. Block their email address in the future. If they ever do get to the point where they are willing to listen, they will be determined enough to find someone else. This does not come to this point often. Over the years I must have blocked out 30 people and no more than that.

Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com


This is why I do it after all these years.

The nearly 50,000 VA-documented PTSD cases far exceed the 30,000 military personnel that the Pentagon officially classifies as wounded in the conflicts. The discrepancy underscores the view by military and civilian health officials, such as Lt. Gen. James Campbell, director of the Army staff, that troops tend to ignore, hide or fail to recognize their mental health wounds until after their military service.

http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/
2007-10-18-veterans-stress_N.htm?csp=34&loc=interstitialskip

This is why I started doing it 25 years ago.

Vietnam Veterans
The National Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Study (NVVRS) was conducted by the U.S. government following a congressional mandate in 1983 to better understand the psychological effect of being in the Vietnam War. Among Vietnam veterans, approximately 15% of men and 9% of women were found to have PTSD at the time of the study. Approximately 30% of men and 27% of women had PTSD at some point in their life following Vietnam.

These rates were much higher than those found among non-Vietnam veterans and civilians. The rates are alarming since they indicate that at the time of the study, there were about 479,000 cases of PTSD and 1 million lifetime PTSD cases as a result of the Vietnam War.

Persian Gulf War
Although the Persian Gulf War was brief, its impact was no less traumatic than other wars. From the time the Persian Gulf War ended in 1991 to now, veterans have reported a number of physical and mental health problems.

Studies examining the mental health of Persian Gulf War veterans have found that rates of PTSD stemming from the war range anywhere from almost 9% to approximately 24%. These rates are higher than what has been found among veterans not deployed to the Persian Gulf.

Iraq War and Afghanistan
The conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan are ongoing. That's why the full the impact the war has had on the mental health of soldiers in Iraq in not yet known. One study looked at members of four United States combat infantry units (3 Army and 1 Marine) who had served in Iraq and Afghanistan.

The majority of soldiers were exposed to some kind of traumatic, combat-related situations, such as being attacked or ambushed (92%), seeking dead bodies (94.5%), being shot at (95%), and/or knowing someone who was seriously injured or killed (86.5%).

After deployment, approximately 12.5% had PTSD, a rate greater than that found among these soldiers before deployment.
http://ptsd.about.com/od/prevalence/a/MilitaryPTSD.htm

For the jerks out there, if you have any more questions, look in the mirror and ask yourself why you bother to attack people who want to help while you stand in their way from getting it.

VA says 6 percent of combat vets have traumatic brain injuries

VA says 6 percent of combat vets have TBIs



By Rick Maze - Staff writer
Posted : Friday Nov 2, 2007 13:29:25 EDT



About 6 percent of Afghanistan and Iraq war veterans seeking treatment at Department of Veterans Affairs hospitals have been diagnosed with traumatic brain injuries, according to preliminary data released Friday.

A VA mandatory screening program that took effect in April has looked at 61,285 veterans of the wars. Of those, 19.2 percent were identified on the screening questionnaire as potentially suffering from traumatic brain injuries and were referred for more tests.

The additional tests resulted in about 3,600 veterans — 5.8 percent of all of those screened —being diagnosed with moderate to severe cases of combat-related brain injuries, said VA spokeswoman Alison Aikele.
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Marine Lance Corporal Jeffrey Lucey's family to sue

Family sues government over Iraq veteran's suicide David Edwards and Muriel Kane
Published: Friday November 2, 2007

A recent study by the Veterans Affairs Department showed that since 2001, 430 combat veterans have committed suicide either while serving in Afghanistan or Iraq or after leaving the service. Others died after returning from combat but while still in uniform.

One of those veterans was Marine Lance Corporal Jeffrey Lucey, who died by his own hand in June 2004. His parents, Kevin and Joyce Lucey, are now suing both the government and the former Secretary of Veterans Affairs over their son's death. The Luceys are members of an anti-war group, Military Families Speak Out, and hope their lawsuit will help force an overhaul of the VA system.

click post title for the rest

After trauma touches life

Several veterans told me that if they ever opened up with what is going on in their heads, they would be locked up in the "loony bin" for the rest of their lives. They talk about feeling as if they let everyone down. They talk about a lot of things but hope. As they try to understand what PTSD is, hope is the furthest thing from their reach. Once they understand what it is and what caused it, hope is within reach. They realize they can be happy, or at least happier again. To live out days with life being sucked out of them is a slow, torturous death. Medication and therapy bring them back to living a life again instead of just existing.


After trauma comes stress that will not let go. It is not just participants in combat.
It is when you watch someone you love die.

Improving Communication With Families Of Dying Patients Reduces ...
By admin Hospitals that use a simple strategy of enhancing communication with family members of patients dying in the intensive care unit can greatly reduce post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety and depression after their loved one dies,

It is being a police officer with your life on the line.

The Effects of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) on the officer and the family
© 2003, 1998 by Hal Brown, LICSW
The following letter is from an officer who wrote it in the Guestbook and kindly gave me permission to use it in an article in the hope that his experience will help others. He describes many of the classic symptoms of police PTSD, or post traumatic stress disorder. In fact, every distressing thought, feeling and behavior he relates below is a symptom of PTSD.
I am a (10 plus)-- year police veteran and (30 plus)-- years of age. I have become seriously concerned with some of the events that have been taking place in my life for the past two years. I have started having nightmares frequently and have great difficulty going to sleep at night. There is always a feeling of uneasiness at night and I have started to develop some unnatural habits associated with these uneasy feelings. At the slightest sound, I have to get out of the bed and check every room in the house.
http://www.geocities.com/stressline_com/ptsd-family.html

Arizona State Trooper WinsPrecedent-Setting Court Caseon PTSD Claim
An Arizona state trooper has won a precedent-setting court case that affects police officers, firefighters, and other emergency services workers throughout the United States.On January 20, 2000, Department of Public Safety Officer David D. Mogel killed a shotgun-toting car thief wanted for bank robbery after the suspect attempted to shoot him.Because of the trauma in taking a human life, Mr. Mogel was diagnosed with Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, and could no longer function as a police officer. When he applied for Workers' Compensation benefits, he was denied. The Arizona Department of Public Safety and Workers' Compensation (State of Arizona, DOA Risk Management) claimed that shooting suspects was part of the job, and not an "unexpected" event as required by Arizona law.Mr. Mogel's attorney, Robert E. Wisniewski, says, "The state raised the defense that working in police work everyday was not a substantial contributing cause of my client's post traumatic stress disorder because police are exposed to such hazards everyday so that is routine."In her Findings and Award of December 19, 2002 awarding Mr. Mogel Workers' Compensation benefits, Administrative Law Judge Karen Calderon states, "I find that shooting and killing another human being in the line of duty is an extraordinary stress related to the employment."
http://www.copshock.com/lawsuit.html

Police, fireman and emergency responders

A number of research articles have looked at the rates of PTSD in high-risk occupations. They found:
Law Enforcement Officers who agreed to be in these studies had rates of PTSD ranging between 3% - 17%. A recent research study found that 45% of officers were having sleep difficulties typical of patients seen in insomnia clinics. In this study, stresses related to their work environment were strongly associated with sleep quality; sleep disturbances were associated with symptoms of PTSD. "These high rates of insomnia are particularly alarming, because sleep deprivation can drastically hinder mental and physical performance" (Thomas Neylan, MD, 2002).
In a study by Corneil, et. al., (1999), which compared 203 U.S. Fire Fighters in urban departments with 625 Canadian fire fighters, twenty-two percent of fire fighters in U.S. urban departments were experiencing PTSD compared to 17% of Canadian fire fighters. (The U.S. sample had 9% women and 13% paramedics, not found in the Canadian sample). Other researchers have found 33-41 % of fire fighters were experiencing emotional distress. Rates of PTSD in U.S. fire fighters are similar to those found in a study of German fire fighters, 18.2% and are higher than those generally found in wounded combat veterans, i.e., 20%. These researchers concluded that the high level of PTSD A suggests that this is a serious mental health problem of epidemic proportions in urban professional firefighters in the U.S."
Twenty percent of Emergency Ambulance Personnel have been found to have PTSD. Rates of symptoms, such as depression, anxiety, sleep problems and undue worry rage from 20% - 60%.
Nineteen percent of Rescue Workers serving 9-11 sites have been diagnosed with PTSD in the two years following this tragedy.
http://www.rescue-workers.com/1.html

And it is kids

Bereaved Children of 9/11 Victims Suffered High Rates of Psychiatric Illness
Children's Neurological "Stress-Response System" Also Stayed Highly Active Long After They Lost a Parent, Study Finds
White Plains, NY (Mar 19, 2007)
The rate of psychiatric illness among children who lost a parent in the Sept. 11, 2001, World Trade Center attack doubled – from about 32 to nearly 73 percent – in the years following the event, according to a new study from researchers at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center.
More than half (56.8 percent) of the young children studied suffered from some sort of anxiety disorder, including post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), which affected nearly three in 10 bereaved children.

http://www.nyp.org/news/hospital/1107.html

PTSD comes at different levels. From mild cases where they are able to function or "deal with it" to the point where every part of their life is consumed by it.

Understanding, educating the public is life to them and their futures.

To put a monetary price on this we need only look at "success" stories to gauge what the outcome of early intervention would look like.

Instead of being unable to work but receiving therapy and medication, it saves workman's comp and VA disability payments. If they are able to work, even on a part-time basis, they are holding down a job, receiving pay for that job, paying taxes on that income and paying into the Social Security System.

But it does not stop there. Early intervention can prevent a lot of divorces. Living with someone who has PTSD is one of the hardest types of marriages. (I can testify to that personally.) The emotional roller-coaster ride with mood swings, isolation, ambivalence, emotional numbing, short term memory loss, irrational thinking and reactions along with the flashbacks they have and the nightmares, puts an even greater strain on a marriage than what is considered normal. Two incomes in one household contribute to the economy. If you have separation and divorce, you have two people struggling to support themselves. That leaves less extra money to spend on non-essential items.

But it does not stop there either. When you intervene early and eliminate PTSD divorces, you also have people watching over each other. They eat better, see the doctor more often for check ups and enjoy a support structure with people they trust.

It does not even stop there. Then you have the children of a PTSD parent. They grow up knowing that the PTSD parent is acting or reacting the way they are because of PTSD and not because of them. They learn to adapt to things they learn will cause a "strange" reaction from their parent. Like, as most kids do, hiding and popping out to scare their parent or sneaking up on them from behind.

With all of this, please tell me why anyone in this country or other nations, would not be doing everything possible to treat PTSD as soon as symptoms present themselves? Why would anyone not be doing everything humanly possible to educate the public on PTSD so that no one would ever say "what's that" when they hear the term? Public education made everyone aware of AIDS, cancer, ADD. So why is it people still don't know what PTSD is? They surely know what trauma is. Why isn't there a massive TV campaign about PTSD? Why isn't every news station doing documentaries on this?

As you read in the previous post today, a five year old came out with "they forget to be happy" when asked what he thought PTSD was. So why is it a five year old can come to grips with this but the adults of this country are still not understanding this?

Kathie Costos
Namguardianangel@aol.com
http://www.namguardianangel.org/
http://www.namguardianangel.blogspot.com/
http://www.woundedtimes.blogspot.com/
"The willingness with which our young people are likely to serve in any war, no matter how justified, shall be directly proportional to how they perceive veterans of early wars were treated and appreciated by our nation." - George Washington

"Tell Them I Didn't Cry" by Jackie Spinner

"It's not a hero's story!" said Jackie Spinner about her book "Tell Them I Didn't Cry," which relates the nearly two years that she spent in Iraq as a journalist for the Washington Post. The book was a main topic of conversation during the convocation that she gave on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD.

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, as defined in the fourth edition of "The American Heritage College Dictionary," is a psychological disorder of individuals who have experienced profound trauma, such as torture, marked by recurrent flashbacks, nightmares, eating disorders, anxiety, fatigue, forgetfulness, and withdrawal.

When Spinner spoke with the Honors 190 class, she explained that her five-year-old nephew Aiden summed PTSD up by saying, "It is where someone has seen so many sad things that they forget how to be happy."

According to Spinner, that is a very accurate definition. "You have to learn how to live again." For many, that is hard to do.

As a journalist, words are Spinner's life. Of the time she spent in Iraq, Spinner said, "I fought with my pen."

However, when Spinner returned home she was unable to find any words that expressed what she experienced. Therefore, Spinner turned to art therapy.
click post title for the rest

A five year old can understand what PTSD but too many in this country can't or won't. For some with PTSD, they feel they do not deserve to be happy either.

Web-Based Treatment for PTSD

Web-Based Treatment for PTSD
Reductions in posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and depression among military service members were greater with an 8-week program of cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) delivered over the Internet than with Internet-based supportive counseling. Of 24 patients randomly assigned to online CBT, 25% no longer had a PTSD diagnosis after treatment or at 6-month follow-up, compared to 5% after treatment and 3% at 6 months for those assigned to online supportive counseling. Litz et al. (CME, p. 1676) present details of DE-STRESS (DElivery of Self-TRaining and Education for Stressful Situations). Each patient had an initial face-to-face interview with a therapist and was allowed telephone and e-mail contacts during treatment. The web program included symptom ratings, CBT content, and homework assignments. Dr. Ruth Lanius relates these findings to the complexity of PTSD in an editorial on p. 1628.
http://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/cgi/content/full/164/11/A42

You know I'm a believer in helping them on line, but this study was very small. I think it does offer hope that on-line help does in fact help. Even the tiny bit I do, at least gets them to the point where they are willing to go for help. Once they open up, they begin to feel better about themselves and have more hope once they understand what PTSD is. Given the fact the VA and the DOD are so far behind on playing catch up, this needs all the fresh, new ideas it can get. I do know that if the net was available when they came home from Vietnam, you wouldn't have had them suffering while walking around for over 30 years without knowing what it was. The support system is a great tool for them to cope and heal.