DoD does not know if PTSD programs work, duh

Obviously THEY DO NOT WORK OF WE WOULDN'T BE SEEING SO MANY SUFFERING ALL THESE YEARS!

Report: DoD does not know if PTSD programs work
By Patricia Kime
Staff writer
Posted : Friday Jul 13, 2012

The Defense Department has a woeful lack of information on the effectiveness and related costs of its post-traumatic stress disorder treatment programs, despite having spent millions on various initiatives to address psychological health and traumatic brain injury, a panel of top scientists concluded in a report released Friday.

In a review of DoD and Veterans Affairs Department PTSD treatments mandated by Congress in 2010, an Institute of Medicine panel found fewer than half of all service members and veterans who screen positive for the disorder’s symptoms — 40 percent — have received referrals for care, and of those, just 65 percent actually go on to get help.

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• Read the report

The group also concluded that DoD and VA should improve tracking of treatment and outcomes and institute research programs to evaluate the effectiveness of their programs.

“Treatment isn’t reaching everyone who needs it, and the departments aren’t tracking which treatments are being used or evaluating how well they work in the long term,” said committee chairman Sandro Galea, head of the epidemiology department at Columbia University.

The withering report comes as DoD and VA grapple with rising mental health issues within their ranks, including suicide.

Of the more than 2.6 million active-duty, National Guard and reserve members who deployed to combat operations in the past decade, an estimated 13 percent to 20 percent have or might develop PTSD, according to other Defense Department and Rand Corp. studies.
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