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| LISTENING: Vietnam vet William Rider counsels younger vets of wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Fred Greaves/Special to CSM |
Older veterans now helping vets of Iraq and Afghanistan
Having 'been there' themselves, Vietnam veterans are better able to listen to and counsel younger vets troubled by their combat experience.
from the June 9, 2008 edition
Page 2 of 3
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Reporter Jill Carroll discusses the techniques used to de-stigmatize veterans with psychological injuries.
More than 35,000 troops who served in those wars have been diagnosed with PTSD, says the Office of the Surgeon General (see chart). But a RAND Corp. report estimates that some 300,000 of them are experiencing PTSD or major depression, both considered factors in suicide. RAND reports that another 320,000 may have sustained a traumatic brain injury (TBI), usually caused by an explosion and associated with memory loss and personality changes.
Repeated and extended deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan are driving psychological injuries upward, say military and civilian doctors, despite a spectrum of new government programs aimed at preventing and treating them.
With the advent of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army started programs to teach soldiers how to identify signs of PTSD, prepare mentally for combat, and remove the stigma of seeking help.
The VA recently announced the creation of a panel to advise the agency on improving its suicide-prevention effort. Last year it created positions at each VA medical center to oversee suicide prevention and started a suicide hot line.
There is also research involving new treatments. At the Naval Medical Center in San Diego, Cmdr. Scott Johnston, director for clinical research, just completed a three-year study using virtual-reality technology to help veterans overcome fear, anxiety, and flashbacks. After five to 10 weeks of treatment, 80 percent of the participants no longer had PTSD symptoms.
But for some vets struggling to overcome psychological injuries, an important element of treatment involves their peers. The Canadian government and the United Kingdom's Royal Marines have both adopted programs based on veterans helping other veterans with psychological injuries. In the US, informal veterans groups are providing similar services.
"It's not that credentialed professionals have no role," says Dr. Shay, who won a MacArthur Foundation grant for his treatment of Vietnam veterans diagnosed with combat trauma. "It's that they don't belong on center stage."
ACVOW's volunteers, who work from a tiny room in the La Jolla VA hospital as well as a facility on the Camp Pendleton Marine Corps base in San Diego, use their own money and some modest donations along with their credibility as combat veterans to help the new generation address psychological injuries and navigate the VA system. They see firsthand the cost of shortfalls in the mental-health care system.
"What we're seeing is marines committing suicide by motorcycle, or car," or by forcing police to shoot them, says Rider. "They are fed up with the fact they can't get some peace and quiet in their head."
ACVOW formed in 2001. Following the terrorist attacks of 9/11, many veterans of past wars reported troubling flashbacks.
"They were coming out of the woodwork," says Michael Sloan, a cofounder of the group. These days the La Jolla office is usually bustling with young men dropping by, cautiously looking for help.
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