PTSD Among Military Veterans Research Paper

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder also known as PTSD is an emotional condition that can develop following a traumatic or terrifying event. PTSD has only been recognized as a diagnosis since 1980. This emotional disorder was brought to public attention after soldiers would return home and often referred to as “shell shock or combat fatigue”.

PTSD, or Post-traumatic Stress Disorder, is a psychiatric disorder that can occur following the experience or witnessing of a life-threatening events such as military combat, natural disasters, terrorist incidents, serious accidents, or physical or sexual assault in adult or childhood. Most survivors of trauma return to normal given a little time. However, some people will have stress reactions that do not go away on their own, or may even get worse over time. These individuals may develop PTSD. People who suffer from PTSD often relive the experience through nightmares and flashbacks, have difficulty sleeping, and feel detached or estranged, and these symptoms can be severe enough and last long enough to significantly impair the person’s daily life.

Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a severe anxiety disorder that can develop after exposure to any event that results in psychological trauma. This event may involve the threat of death to oneself or to someone else, or to one's own or someone else's physical, sexual, or psychological integrity, overwhelming the individual's ability to cope. As an effect of psychological trauma, PTSD is less frequent and more enduring than the more commonly seen acute stress response. Diagnostic

PTSD, Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, is a mental health condition that can occur after a person experiences a traumatic event such as disasters, assault or combat. This is an issue that many Veterans encounter while being involved in military duty. However, there is help available.

The first type of Treatment is called Cognitive behavioral therapy or CBT. Research says that this is the best type of treatment and counseling for anyone diagnosed with PTSD. Cognitive behavioral therapy is used to help the veteran think differently about their thoughts or feelings from the past. The main goal by the therapist is to help the veteran find out what past events or flashbacks correlate with the veteran’s thoughts that make the symptoms of PTSD occur. Many times, the veterans will blame themselves for a decision they made but the therapist will walk them through on how it was not their fault. Cognitive Behavioral therapy can last for three to six months. Although to some people it may seem that CBT might be the best type of treatment, it does not always work. One reason why it might not work is because the therapist may like the experience and education. The therapist may be qualified but sometimes, the therapist may fail at connecting with patient. The connection that is missed by some therapists and patients can simply occur by the therapist not having all the knowledge about all the situations soldiers face when they go to war. Soldiers struggle with their therapy if they feel that the therapist who is helping them does not have the knowledge about the battlefield or the difficulties of war itself. The relationship of the therapist and veteran can also play a major role on the effectiveness of the therapy. Some soldiers may struggle with feeling comfortable with their therapist because they are sensitive and emotional. Sometimes veterans struggle with this therapy if they cannot develop a relationship with their therapist. Another factor that can affect the effectiveness of CBT is the timing. Sometimes three to six months is not enough to show long term effectiveness of the therapy. Another treatment option is exposure therapy.

Soldiers going into their 2nd tour/war enter into it with a at least 5% of them being depressed; leading symptoms in PTSD. With P.T.S.D coming up that is becoming very bad but it can be helping people at the same depending on what treatment that they take. P.T.S.D in veterans is very serious but it can also be cured by the multiple resources. The topic of P.T.S.D possesses a multitude of causes, which negatively impact the victim, his or her family and the society in which the victim lives; nevertheless, many treatments or solutions are provided for the victim to lessen that impact on the future of his or her life.

I will be collaborating with The National Institute of Mental Health for the funding of the research project. The research will attempt to identify what factors determine whether someone with PTSD will respond well to Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT) intervention, aiming to develop more personalized, effective and efficient treatments. The mission of this project is to transform the understanding and treatment of mental illnesses through basic and clinical research, paving the way for prevention, recovery, and cure (National Institutes of Health, 2013).

The use of new anti-PTSD drugs and treatments, particularly the ones mentioned in the report’s conclusion, should be possible only after finish of their careful and independent studies in laboratory conditions. The start of the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs to use prolonged-exposure therapy and cognitive-processing therapy long before the profound investigations on their efficiency have been made is reprehensible and disappointing fact. It’s a good luck that the mentioned forms of therapy demonstrate satisfying results, but another experiment may be less lucky.

While the TM therapy was beneficial for the PTSD-diagnosed soldiers as indicated by the results, there are still limitation to consider. The limitations of these study include the small sample size and the short time frame in which the experiment was conducted. At the end of the experiment, only ten veterans had completed the study in the TM group and eight in the psychotherapy group. The short 3 month time period, however, indicates the results produced from TM showed a significant decrease in PTSD symptoms compared to normal therapy further revealing ™’s effectiveness. Hankey references to Irbarren’s study that PTSD is increasing with six to eight million people currently suffering from the disorder,

(McElhiney, Moody, Steif, Prudic, Devanand, Sackheim, (1995) Studies show psychotherapy is one of the most used therapies for PTSD, but it’s not as effective as other therapies might be.

In this paper that I am writing, I will be discussing the different types of treatments for PTSD also knows as post-traumatic stress disorder. More in specifically I will be discussing PTSD in veterans who have been diagnosed already. A little history about PTSD is that it first began as a disorder people would acquire after coming back from certain wars in our history, and back then they really did not know that much about it. Living in this day and age there have been so many more studies, trials, and tests done and psychologists have come up with many ways to treat PTSD. But, just because we have the cures and treatments does not mean everyone is getting the treatment they need. Furthermore, I have selected three scholarly and peer reviewed articles from ProQuest that will ensure that my topic is adequately discussed about. The articles I have chosen also each have different key points and conclusions in each one. First I will discuss certain factors associated with PTSD and some of the outcomes on the nervous system. Next I will discuss a certain drug associated with the treatment of PTSD and the effectiveness of so called drug. And lastly, I will discuss the overall treatment for PTSD veteran victims and if the amount of treatment they get is enough.

PTSD has been examining that cognitive behavioural therapy is a highly-proven treatment for post traumatic stress disorder. This book states that psychotherapy is one of the main treatments that a PTSD suffering victim should do. The first chapter presents some considerations in planning treatment. The boo review the DSM-IV diagnostic and gives numerous validated tools that can be used in potential application for clinical practise. It also discusses specialized treatments for PTSD, it reviews some of the current evidence for medical treatment of PTSD. It gives reviews for treatments about PTSD in children, however there is no literature supporting this. The weakness of this book is that although it gives many treatments that can be considered

As most serviceman came back from overseas from a combat environment, many develop symptoms of Post-Traumatic Stress disorder (PTSD). Some has a hard time dealing with the past and instead of talking to others they tend to keep it toward themselves. Cognitive behavioral therapy is a type of counseling that is available and also most effective when it comes to counseling PTSD (Siegel, 2013). The VA is a great example that provides two forms of cognitive behavioral therapy to Veterans. One being Cognitive Processing and the other Prolonged Exposure therapy. Also take in consideration that there are drugs that can help and that are effective for the

They cause intense emotions and are very intrusive for the person suffering from them. These memories are a common stressor for veterans and these stressors help indicate to counselors what to work on (Myers, pars. 3-4). The most common treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder is psychotherapy or medication. The most highly recommended therapy for this condition is “trauma-focused psychotherapy;” this therapy focuses on the memories of traumatic event or the meaning behind them (“PTSD”, pars. 1-2). These treatments help veterans to visualize, talk about, to think about a traumatic event; other treatments try to focus on changing the unhelpful beliefs about their trauma. One type of treatment is called prolonged exposure (PE) which helps sufferers to gain control over their negative feelings by facing them; they talk about their experiences and do some of the activities that they have avoided since their trauma (“PTSD”, par.3). Another therapy is cognitive processing therapy (CPT). This helps those with PTSD to reframe their negative thoughts by talking and writing about them. There is also eye-movement desensitization and reprocessing (EDMR); this form of psychoactive therapy helps to make sense of the trauma. It involves thinking of the trauma while following a bac-and-fourth movement or sound (“PTSD”, pars. 4-5). These forms of therapy may be helpful in certain cases but for many post-traumatic stress disorders suffers, therapy is not enough and they must supplement it with

Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is often used to help patients with PTSD to regain a sense of control of their life in order to improve the quality of life. The basic of Cognitive Behavioral Therapy is one that refers to any kind of treatment based on the idea that psychological issues appear due to the way in which we interpret situation, or evaluate feelings and thoughts (Caddell, 2015). It has been found to be successful in counseling in order to improve and reduce their symptoms, and learn healthier ways to cope if any stressful thoughts appear again (Tull, 2013).