Kentucky National Guardsmen prove stigma of PTSD lives on

One more example of "resilience" training not working. The stigma lives on and more take their own lives no matter what the DOD says they have done about prevention.

Kentucky National Guard partners with University of Louisville to expand combat trauma counseling
Courier Journal
Written by Chris Kenning
Nov. 7, 2013

A Department of Veterans Affairs report last year found that nearly 30 percent of the more than 834,000 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans treated at VA Hospitals had been diagnosed with PTSD.

As more than a decade of war winds down in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Kentucky National Guard is initiating a new effort to treat combat trauma among returning veterans who often have to wait for help.

The Guard is partnering with the University of Louisville’s Psychiatry Department in a project to offer therapy for veterans, an effort to funnel them more quickly into treatment and work to minimize prescription drug use for post-traumatic stress and depression.

“We have a lot of mental-health issues with our soldiers that we’re trying to address,” said David Altom, a spokesman for the Kentucky Guard, which announced the pilot program that, while open to all vets, focus on Guard soldiers.

Spurred partly by two-week wait times at some Veterans Affairs mental health services, the use of U of L therapists may also draw veterans previously reluctant to seek care in military facilities, said Capt. Stephanie Fields, deputy state surgeon for the Kentucky Guard.

“I think there is still a stigma,” Fields said. “They don’t want it reflected in their military record and affecting their career.”
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