For Iraq Veterans, Counseling Common

By AP Wire Service

A study finds that more than a third seek help within a year of their return.

CHICAGO (AP) — More than a third of U.S. soldiers received psychological counseling soon after returning from Iraq, according to a Pentagon study.

The researchers did not find the results surprising, because the military has a new mental health screening program for returning soldiers and is encouraging them to get help early, said the study’s co-author Dr. Charles Hoge, a colonel at the Walter Reed Army Institute of Research.

Because of the new screening program, the findings cannot be compared with those from previous wars, Hoge said.

“There are psychological consequences of war and we want to address those up front,” Hoge said.

Thirty-five percent of Iraq veterans received mental health care during their first year home, the study said. In addition, some sort of mental problem was diagnosed in 12 percent of the more than 222,000 returning Army soldiers and Marines in the study.

Nineteen percent of those back from Iraq reported mental health concerns, compared with 11 percent of those back from Afghanistan and 8.5 percent of those returning from other places, such as Bosnia.

The study appears in Wednesday’s Journal of the American Medical Association.

Medical authorities first accepted post-traumatic stress disorder as a psychiatric condition in 1980.

A previous study by Hoge and his colleagues found 15 percent to 17 percent of soldiers returning from Iraq showed signs of the disorder, and many were reluctant to seek help because of the stigma attached to mental illness.

JAMA: http://jama.ama-assn.org