Whatever You Call It, PTSD Needs To Be Dealt With

I listened to an Osher lecture on PTSD recently, and learned a lot.  What I came away with was that we are not doing nearly enough to help soldiers returning from combat who have suffered PTSD.  At least we no longer consider those suffering from PTSD to have a personal weakness, as was so often thought in the past.  We need to get treatment for returning veterans as soon as possible, and this has been a problem.

Exposure to traumatic experiences has always been a part of the human condition.  Attacks by saber tooth tigers or twenty-first century terrorists have likely led to similar psychological responses in survivors.  Over the course of history, there have been at least 80 names for what we now call Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Earlier names, most of which referred to combat trauma, included Shell Shock, Battle Fatigue, Irritable Heart, Nostalgia, Soldier's Heart, and Combat Stress Reaction.  Up until1980, trauma from war was not treated as a psychological condition, but one of weakness.  Soldiers who complained during WW1, were often executed.  During WW2 they were considered weak, and were sent to the front lines of battle.  Up to half of WW2 military discharges were said to be the result of combat exhaustion.  CSR was treated using proximity, immediacy and expectancy principles.  The sufferers were expected to make a complete recovery with rest, and would be returned to the battlefield.

It wasn't until 1952 that the American Psychiatric Association produced the first Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM-1), which included gross stress reaction.  In 1980, the APA added PTSD to DSM-111, which stemmed from research involving returning Vietnam vets, Holocaust survivors, sexual trauma victims and others.  Links between the trauma of war and post-military civilian life were established.

Much has been done to help PTSD victims, but more needs to be done.  Evidence of this is the extremely high rate of suicide by veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan.

Common in many PTSD victims is the inability to talk about the events that created such trauma in their lives.  Few Holocaust survivors want to relive the experience, and few veterans talk about their war experience.  We need to get trauma victims the help they need without delay.