Health | Brains of vets with PTSD can change as they age | Seattle Times Newspaper

SAN FRANCISCO — Combat veterans with post-traumatic stress disorder are more likely to have dementia, cardiac problems and structural changes in the brain as they get older than veterans without PTSD, according to new research.

The findings, which for the most part resulted from research at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center, raise concerns about the overall health of aging veterans, but hold promise for the potential of helping to treat these diseases.

"Our concern is that veterans who honorably serve our country ... are at greater risk of developing Alzheimer's disease and over the next 10 to 20 years we will see a lot of Alzheimer's in the veteran population,"said Dr. Michael Weiner, director of the institution's Center for Imaging of Neurodegenerative Diseases.

By VICTORIA COLLIVER

San Francisco Chronicle

Health | Brains of vets with PTSD can change as they age | Seattle Times Newspaper

Helping Service Members Transition to Life Back Home Read more: http://www.andhranews.net/Business/2011/Helping-Service-Members-Transition-Life-Back-28450.htm#ixzz1QhAicK2Z

(Family Features) Returning home from deployment can be difficult for any service member. Members of the National Guard and Reserve have a unique challenge balancing their military service with civilian life, and returning to a civilian life that does not include those with whom they served can be especially stressful. However, resources like the Real Warriors Campaign are available for service members who are experiencing challenges associated with transition.

Sponsored by the Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury (DCoE), the Real Warriors Campaign is a public education initiative designed to encourage service members, veterans, and their families to seek care and treatment for the invisible wounds of war.

Read more: http://www.andhranews.net/Business/2011/Helping-Service-Members-Transition-Life-Back-28450.htm#ixzz1QhAqL1rU


http://www.andhranews.net/Business/2011/Helping-Service-Members-Transition-Life-Back-28450.htm

Psychology Course Prepares Military Providers for Deployment Concerns

During the Center for Deployment Psychology (CDP) course, “Topics in Deployment Psychology,” a panel of five military mental health care providers spoke about their recent deployment. The discussion raised an important question on self-care while deployed: how can a provider stay mentally fit while addressing the psychological health of troops?
For Capt. (Dr.) Tracy Mayfield, a clinical psychologist with the U.S. Air Force deployed to northeast Afghanistan, she found company with the base’s working dog.
“I had to take time out from being a psychologist to have ‘me time’ and relax,” said Mayfield, who was the forward operating base psychologist for about a thousand troops. “Every Sunday, I’d take the dog for a walk. I’m a pet lover, and it really helped.”
CDP is part of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences and a component center of Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury (DCoE). The course, held at the National Intrepid Center of Excellence from June 7 to June 16, 2011, offered an overview of deployment issues facing service members, their families and providers, geared toward uniformed behavioral health providers from all branches of the military.

By Robyn Mincher

http://www.dodlive.mil/index.php/2011/06/psychology-course-prepares-military-providers-for-deployment-concerns/

Adrenaline and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

The learning experience became re-enforced because of the high level of adrenaline that the rat produced showing that adrenaline is a key to long-term memory of life-threatening or shocking experiences. From this brief experiment one can say that adrenaline may be the most powerful mind altering drug known to man and when frightened this chemical reaction runs its super powerful course in pursuing “survival reaction”. The worst effect of adrenaline may be that one’s brain may become addicted to that same rush of adrenaline creating a dependency effect. In this manner it is easy to see how post traumatic stress disorder, with its flashbacks, hyper tension, and sometimes feeling of invincibility can take complete control over the body. As stress builds the body unconsciously and automatically produces more adrenaline which each subsequent experience.

Many of those in the military who have experienced combat can relate to the feeling of adrenaline production that fear can produce, and understand the feeling of an almost euphoric state as the body goes into survival mode. The high level of intensity created by traumatic events may then become a “need” that almost has to be fed. I can now understand how, back in the Vietnam era, we saw many of our fellow warriors volunteer for multiple tours of duty in the combat zone. They became addicted to the action. While adrenaline may be the one element that instills survival, it can also destroy the lives of those warriors when they have to return to the mundane world of civilian life.

by Ed Mattson

Adrenaline and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD)

Combat Awareness Month gives hope to war fighters

MARINE CORPS BASE CAMP PENDLETON, Calif. — Col. James B. Seaton, base commander in 2008, designated June as “Combat Operational Stress Awareness Month,” shedding light on an important issue affecting thousands of Marines and sailors aboard Camp Pendleton.

“At first, it felt like every negative emotion I’d ever felt all combined into one,” said a lance corporal with three combat deployments undergoing Post Traumatic Stress Disorder treatment, who preferred to remain anonymous. “I started drinking heavily and got a (Driving Under the Influence). Now, with this counseling, it’s getting easier to cope.”

Camp Pendleton is the only installation in the Marine Corps to take on the month-long initiative to raise awareness and to overcome the perceived negative stigma.

“When 9/11 happened, and subsequently we were fighting two wars, we experienced more service members coming into our facility with combat stress issues,” said R. Barry Francke, assistant manager and clinical supervisor, Counseling and Behavioral Health Services, Marine Corps Community Services. “We knew that for every one person that came in there were several more that needed to hear it was okay to get help.”

By Cpl. Jenn Calaway

Combat Awareness Month gives hope to war fighters

Training for Families of Returning Veterans

is an online role-playing simulation designed to prepare families of returning veterans to 1) recognize when their loved one is exhibiting signs of post-deployment stress, including signs of PTSD, TBI, depression, and thoughts of suicide, and 2) talk to the veteran about their concern and, if necessary motivate them to seek help at the local VA medical center.

http://www.kognito.com/atrisk/product_families.html

New research shows how post traumatic stress disorder affects the body | abc7news.com

SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- New research on post traumatic stress disorder will be released next week at a conference hosted by the Veteran's Health Research Institute in San Francisco. ABC7 got a preview of the studies, which suggest that PTSD can dramatically affect a person's health as they age.

The conference is called "Preparing For the Future of Veterans Health" and the early research indicates that PTSD affects the body as well as the brain.

Researchers are learning that the psychological wounds of war, known as post traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD have a devastating biological impact.

"Theme of this conference is that we're thinking about the aging veteran," said Dr. Thomas Neylan.

Neylan, the head of PTSD research at the San Francisco Veteran's Administration, showed one area of the brain, that's affected by PTSD. It's called the hippocampus. It looks like a little jelly roll and is responsible for memory.

By: Cheryl Jennings

New research shows how post traumatic stress disorder affects the body | abc7news.com

MHS News > Reducing Stigma through Technology

With technological development at the forefront of an evolving military medical community, there has been a significant increase in the demand for mobile connectivity and information sharing capabilities. Currently, there are easily accessible mobile applications (apps) in the hands of thousands of veterans, service members and their families that are being utilized as useful tools to connect to important military medical issues, particularly mental health information and resources.


T2 collaborated with the VA's National Center for PTSD to develop this app to assist veterans and active duty personnel (and civilians) who are experiencing symptoms of PTSD.“As the general public has shifted its focus to include mobile applications and mobile websites as a way to access various resources, [the DoD] became more interested in mobile solutions. My primary role is working on design and implementation of mobile products, from apps to text messaging initiatives,” says Dr. Julia Hoffman, clinical psychologist, mobile apps project lead, and Veteran Affairs (VA) liaison, National Center for Telehealth and Technology (T2).

By: Marqeis Sparks

MHS News > Reducing Stigma through Technology

Turning to Software to Help Treat Brain Injuries

Some 400,000 current and former American soldiers suffer fromtraumatic brain injuries, which can cause memory loss, lack of concentration, depression, anxiety attacks and other problems. In some cases symptoms last only weeks or months; sometimes they persist indefinitely.


Finding any sort of treatment, much less a cure, has not been easy. But some neuroscientists now see great potential in techniques of manipulating the brain’s “neuroplasticity,” its propensity to rearrange its neuronal structure in response to behavior and stimuli.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/17/us/17bcbrain.html

Defense.gov News Article: Gates, Mullen Protect Family Programs from Budget Cuts

WASHINGTON, June 15, 2011 – Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates told the service chiefs to “fence” two areas in the budget options the military is contemplating: training and family programs.

“I don't want any money taken out of those,” he told the Senate Appropriations Committee today.

Gates and Navy Adm. Mike Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the nation has an obligation to take care of those service members wounded physically and mentally in the wars.

Gates has moved money for wounded warriors from the supplemental requests and overseas contingency funds. “All of that money has been shifted into the base budget knowing that we will deal with this problem for many, many years to come,” he said. “So for our part, in addition to [Veterans Affairs], we have tried to make sure that the funds for these programs have been protected and will be protected in the future.”

Mullen said the country is just now starting to understand the costs of the wars. He used Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Wash., as an example, saying that many of the service members at that base have deployed -- some multiple times. “Many of those units have had only a year between deployments up to now,” he said. “Now, they're going to have two, and I think they've been compartmentalizing challenges, and they're going to start unpacking that. And it's going to be pretty tough now that we’re back home.”

The military health system and the Veterans Affairs Department need to get at traumatic brain injury and post-traumatic stress now, the admiral said. “The more quickly we get at the problem, the less likely the damage or the damage is reduced significantly, and yet there's still a great deal on the TBI side that we don’t understand,” he said.

Mullen said the relationship between DOD, VA and the civilian communities must get stronger to take care of these men and women. He called on the senators to protect the money to care for wounded service members

By Jim Garamone
American Forces Press Service

Defense.gov News Article: Gates, Mullen Protect Family Programs from Budget Cuts

Healing the invisible wounds of war

(CBS News) 

WALTER REED ARMY MEDICAL CENTER - Since 2003, more than 4,400 Americans have died in Iraq. Many who survive combat face a new battle at home with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Their spouses often suffer along with them. CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports the military is now taking steps to help military wives.

Sgt. David Romanowsky suffered multiple concussions during two tours in Iraq. His wife Gayla has been dealing with the aftershocks ever since.

"A lot of times I would feel like I'm holding all of this in," Gayla said. "I don't know how to take care of my husband. He can't get out of bed."

She is one of 12 stressed-out military wives brought together at Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

More about Walter Reed Army Medical Center

"I was happy finally when they called and said they are starting something up," she said. "Finally you're not alone - there's other people that feel exactly the same way that you do."

Living with the dual scourges of their husbands' brain injuries and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, they see what the rest of us don't.

By

David Martin

Read more: http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/06/14/eveningnews/main20071151.shtml#ixzz1PTfcv2sz

Managing Stress Through Prevention and Coping

Stress affects everyone and in the military, stress is a practically a part of the job.  Whether it’s large workloads, family trouble, financial pressure, job-related anxiety, or any other number of things, stress happens. The key is not so much in learning to live without stresses, but in learning how to deal with them in a productive and healthy manner.

DCoE Director Navy Capt. Paul Hammer kicked off the May webinar by addressing the importance of preventive strategies in managing stress.

The featured presenters echoed these sentiments in their own compelling remarks, highlighting the need to build resilience among service members facing increasingly stressful workloads and family challenges at home

by JTOZER

http://www.dodlive.mil/index.php/2011/06/medical-monday-managing-stress-through-prevention-and-coping/

For Military, Different Wars Mean Different Injuries

There's a new type of tourniquet being issued to every Marine in Afghanistan, former military physician Dr Ron Glasser writes in his new book, Broken Bodies Shattered Minds: A Medical Odyssey from Vietnam to Afghanistan. It's called a combat action tourniquet — essentially a plastic cinch soldiers pull to tighten.

Marines, without anyone ordering them to do so, have begun heading out on foot patrols with the tourniquets already loosely strapped around their thighs, so they can be tightened quickly if a foot or a leg is blown off.

Officers don't like it.

"They view it has a kind of defeatism on the part of the troops," Glasser tells weekends on All Things Considered host Rachel Martin.

The officers feel that by wearing the tourniquet, Marines are resigning themselves to the fact they'll be wounded.

"But the Marines don't care," Glasser says. "The basically say, 'The hell with it. We're going to wear it anyway. If our legs get blown off, at least we'll survive.'"http://www.npr.org/2011/06/12/137066281/for-military-different-wars-mean-different-injuries

U.S. to Put MRIs in Battlefield

Troops fighting in Afghanistan, including Camp Pendleton-based Marines, will soon have better access to cutting-edge technology to help diagnose and treat traumatic brain injury (TBI).

TBI has become the signature injury of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan with approximately 17 to 22 percent of troops returning from Afghanistan believed to have some level of brain injury.

On Wednesday, Naval Medical Logistics Command (NMLC) announced the award of a contract for two mobile Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) systems to Philips Healthcare.

The move creates unprecedented MRI capability for deployed forces as part of the overall comprehensive approach to diagnosing and treating concussive injuries according to a U.S. Navy news release.

http://www.nbcsandiego.com/news/health/US-to-Put-MRIs-on-the-Battlefield-123493454.html

By R. Stickney

Source: U.S. to Put MRIs in Battlefield | NBC San Diego 

Study Points to Need for Increased Womens Specialty Care at VA Hospitals

A new study by the Veterans Administration National Center for PTSD in conjunction with the Boston University School of Medicine has concluded that female combat veterans suffer the symptoms of PTSD in roughly the same proportion as male combat veterans post-deployment.

This is a significant difference from much smaller study published a month earlier, in May 2011, by the Department of Veterans Affairs-New Jersey Health Care System, which showed that female combat veterans suffered from PTSD at higher rates than male combat veterans.

Two possible differences between the studies suggest areas to search for the discrepancy, including the much larger size of the newer study relative to the one released in May, and the more focused study on May concentrating on a particular group of National Guard members rather than a more general study.

Whichever number is the stronger one, one thing is clear. Female veterans have at least as great a need for post-deployment PTSD services geared to their needs as male veterans. This need is largely unmet. While male combat veterans have PTSD groups and day services and other supports created specifically for their needs at nearly every VA hospital in the United States, women's PTSD needs are still largely unmet at the local level.

Author: Maureen ODanu

Read more: http://technorati.com/women/article/ptsd-study-points-to-need-for/#ixzz1Ou2xHD4fhttp://technorati.com/women/article/ptsd-study-points-to-need-for/

UVa researchers eye technology to improve diagnosis of troop brain injuries

Researchers at the University of Virginia are working on technology that could diagnose soldiers withtraumatic brain injuries right on the battlefield.

Dr. James Stone, an assistant professor of radiologyand medical imaging at the UVa School of Medicine, said the work could lead to better treatments and protective gear for soldiers.

A traumatic brain injury, or TBI, is a traumatically induced structural injury or disruption of brain function caused by an external force.

“We’re looking at ways to better diagnose TBI with imaging,” Stone said. “We have this idea and baseline research and we’re now in the process of seeing what is possible.”

Funded by $6 million in grants from the Department of Defense, UVa researchers are working with federal laboratories on two methods to diagnose TBI in soldiers more quickly, Stone said.By SHARON C. FITZGERALD http://www2.dailyprogress.com/news/2011/jun/05/uva-researchers-eye-technology-improve-diagnosis-t-ar-1087382/

Learning a new "three R’s

INDIANAPOLIS - When Soldiers went to school they probably learned the three R's - readin, 'ritin', and 'rithmatic. If the Soldiers come back from a deployment suffering from a traumatic brain injury or post-traumatic stress disorder, the military wants them to learn three new R's - resilience, recovery and reintegration.

The Real Warriors Campaign stresses these three R's and "promotes help-seeking behavior among servicemembers and veterans with invisible wounds and encourages servicemembers to increase their awareness and use of these resources" according to the realwarriors.net

by Staff Sgt. Jeff Lowry

http://www.in.ng.mil/PublicAffairs/LatestNewsandVideoClips/tabid/831/articleType/ArticleView/articleId/658/Learning-a-new-three-Rs.aspx 

IOM Investigates Effectiveness of Current PTSD Treatments

American fighting men and women would benefit from comprehensive approaches for recognizing and treating posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) once they return from active war zones, PTSD experts told panelists at the Institute of Medicine in April in Washington, D.C.

The meeting was part of an ongoing assessment of treatments for PTSD requested by the Department of Defense and Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).

“There should be no wrong door to which veterans or their families can come for help,” said Harold Kudler, M.D., associate director of the VA's Mental Illness Research, Education, and Clinical Center in Durham, N.C., and an associate clinical professor of psychiatry at Duke University Medical Center.

http://pn.psychiatryonline.org/content/46/11/4.1.short?rss=1http://pn.psychiatryonline.org/content/46/11/4.1.short?rss=1

Virtual Humans Keep It Real - SIGNAL Magazine

U.S. Army soldiers have something in common with Superman and Spider-Man: they all benefit from Army-funded virtual reality research being conducted at the University of Southern California Institute for Creative Technologies. The Oscar-winning research has made digital characters look more realistic in movies such as Avatar, Spider-Man II andSuperman Returns, among others, and it also helps soldiers cope with post-traumatic stress disorder. It also is used to train service members for a variety of missions and situations, including countering both improvised explosive devices and insurgency operations, as well as tactical intelligence gathering. The institute’s research, which rapidly is taking the “virtual” out of virtual reality, also helps teach soldiers such traits as leadership, cultural awareness and relationship building.

By George I. Seffers

Virtual Humans Keep It Real - SIGNAL Magazine

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder Reduced by Meditation

Veterans of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars showed a 50 percent improvement in their post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) following eight weeks of practicing meditation, researchers report in this month's issue of Military Medicine.

Researchers, led by Dr. Norman Rosenthal, clinical professor of psychiatry at Georgetown UniversityMedical School, studied five veterans who had engaged in moderate or heavy moderate combat for 10 months to two years in Iraq and/or Afghanistan.

The veterans were taught the Transcendental Meditation technique and then evaluated mainly according to the Clinician Administered PTSD Scale (CAPS), a tool used to diagnose and assess PTSD in trauma survivors.


By Ginger Chan

Organic Farming Helping Soldiers with PTSD

A drug called Seroquel is the military's choice for calming the mental haywire that PTSD vets are dealing with. Seroquel has been linked to suicide and depression and many other serious issues. Yet this is what the military has chosen to "treat" these soldiers with. Soldiers no longer able to handle the war in their minds turn to drugs, alcohol and suicide as a way of escaping. They come home with no knowledge of how to act or what to do to straighten their lives out and to have a "normal" life.

Well there is one group of Americans that are not sitting on their hands anymore and they have come together and formed the Farmer Veteran Coalition. According to the FVC, "The mission of the Farmer-Veteran Coalition is to mobilize our food and farming community to create healthy and viable futures for America's veterans by enlisting their help to build our green economy, rebuild our rural communities and secure a safe and healthy food supply." They are taking PTSD veterans and teaching them how to farm organically.
By: Merlyn Seeley

Veterans not gone and not forgotten

It can be difficult to slice through the clutter of a three-day holiday weekend. Most of us are just content to have a moment to catch our breath and take stock of another school year that has passed. But Memorial Day is dedicated to one very specific thing: remembering the men and women who died in service, the ones who gave it all.

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have created a new category, though: soldiers who are gone but still with us. Army Ranger Scot Noss is alive, but hasn't said a word in four years. Former Navy Corpsman Anthony Thompson is still alive, but he hasn't smiled or moved his limbs on his own since 2007. Both are barely conscious and have the signature wound of these modern wars: traumatic brain injury, or TBI. There are thousands of soldiers living with TBI now. Why? Because in other wars, these soldiers never would have survived. Because of more advanced field medicine and transport, they can now make it out of the theater of war alive, but just barely. The most extreme cases of TBI are soldiers in a minimally conscious state. They can live that way not just for months, but for years, and even decades.

Maria Hinojosa


Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2011/05/29/ED5H1JM6MO.DTL#ixzz1O2DUXkCu