Military, VA Can Do Better in PTSD Response

Military, VA Can Do Better in PTSD Response, Experts Say
Aaron Levin
Psychiatric News
August 17, 2012

The Institute of Medicine again examines the status of treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder for troops and veterans—and offers suggestions for improving diagnosis and care coordination.

The departments of Defense and Veterans Affairs have made strides in identifying and caring for troops and veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), but must continue efforts to improve coordination of care, standardize diagnosis and treatment, and gather better data on outcomes, according to a new report from the Institute of Medicine (IOM).

“If we can work collectively to improve those areas, we can get to where the leaders of the VA and DoD want to be, where all soldiers with PTSD get the care they need and return to full functioning,” said the IOM panel chair, Sandro Galea, M.D., Dr.P.H., a professor and chair of the Department of Epidemiology at the Mailman School of Public Health at Columbia University.

The report is based on two years of analysis of information available from published sources, interviews, and hearings. A second phase of the same panel’s inquiry will review data from ongoing treatment trials and other studies forthcoming from the departments of Defense (DoD) and Veterans Affairs (VA). Those results will be reported in 2014.

More than 2.6 million military personnel have served in Afghanistan since 2001 and in Iraq from 2003 to 2011, said the report. Data indicate that between 13 percent and 20 percent have or may develop PTSD.
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