Records Show How Army Doctors Downgrade PTSD

A Tale of Two Diagnoses: Records Show How Army Doctors Downgrade PTSD
By Keegan Hamilton
Seattle Weekly
Aug. 10 2012

How does one doctor diagnose an Iraq war veteran with PTSD while another says the same soldier has a less severe condition called adjustment disorder? Medical records shared by one of the characters in our feature story this week offer some insight into the workings the controversial forensic psychiatry team at Madigan Army Medical Center.

Here's the relevant background excerpted from our feature story, which chronicles the case of John Byron Etterlee, a chemical weapons specialist stationed at Joint Base Lewis McChord (JBLM):

On July 15, 2011, a Veterans Affairs (VA) psychiatrist interviewed Etterlee and diagnosed him with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). But five months later the diagnosis was abruptly changed to "adjustment disorder"--a lesser condition--by a forensic psychiatrist at Madigan Army Medical Center in Tacoma.

The switch was made even though the clinician merely reviewed paperwork and never spoke with Etterlee or met him face-to-face. Only later did Etterlee learn that he was one of several hundred Fort Lewis soldiers who'd had their PTSD diagnoses downgraded by Madigan doctors.
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