Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Reports of stress disorder leap in military

Reports of stress disorder leap in military - CNN.com:

Army statistics provided by a source that could not be identified because she was not authorized to do so show that incidents of PTSD jumped 47% between 2006 and 2007. Some of the increase is attributed to "better awareness and improved record-keeping." Most of the new cases are found in the ranks of the Army.

Also in this article is an interesting observation by one soldier that shows another disturbing potential trend: diagnosing brain injury as PTSD because it is less expensive to compensate.

"A study published in January indicated that troops who suffered concussions were far more likely to experience PTSD.
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"One soldier who suffers frequent nightmares because of PTSD suspected the military preferred to diagnose the disorder rather than brain injury to save money.

"'The military doesn't want to diagnose people with brain injury,' Sgt. Ryan Kahlor told CNN in January. 'So what they'll do is play it off as PTSD as the sole injury for everyone, because PTSD and traumatic brain injury have very similar symptoms. The disability [compensation] is a lot higher for traumatic brain injury.'"

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