Tribune Review: New Strategies Deployed to Fight Combat Stress

Saturday, March 27, 2010

 Creaking under the weight of constant combat deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, the Army is trying to make itself more resilient to the stress of battle, family separations and the toll of wounded and dead comrades.

Making the Army stronger physically, psychologically and spiritually will help prevent combat stress, post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental wounds, Brig. Gen. Rhonda Cornum told more than 200 physicians, psychologists and social workers Friday.

Key innovations are confidentially testing the psychological state of more than 420,000 soldiers; teaching them how to overcome stress by using scientifically based programs; and training trainers to identify potential mental health problems in the force, Cornum said in remarks at a conference at Southpointe in Washington County about combat stress intervention.

More than 1,800 of these "master resiliency trainers" will be on hand by 2011, most of them noncommissioned officers leading platoons and other small units.

"We're not trying to make baby psychologists. We're trying to make better sergeants," said Cornum, director of the Army's Comprehensive Soldier Fitness program and a former wounded prisoner of war shot down during Operation Desert Storm in 1991.

Some treatments designed for today's combat veterans having problems coping with battlefield trauma seem counterintuitive, but promise to help soldiers faster than traditional techniques. Those suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, for example, come to fear their memories and learn to avoid anything that might trigger painful recollections.

Because combat soldiers and Marines are adept at quashing their emotions, conventional therapies designed to re-create the feelings and images of troubling events don't always work.

But University of Washington professor Hunter Hoffman's "Iraq World" virtual reality video seems to help. A street scene culled from Baghdad unfolds before a soldier. While he relives the blast of an improvised explosive device, he learns to control his fears.

The next frontier: combining fear-dampening drugs, the virtual reality theater and traditional therapy to heal wounded warriors faster.

A key ally in Congress for such research was the late Rep. John Murtha, the Johnstown Democrat and Vietnam War veteran, who championed Washington & Jefferson College's Combat Stress Intervention Program, which organized the conference.

Following Murtha's death Feb. 8, U.S. Rep. Tim Murphy, an Upper St. Clair Republican and clinical child psychologist, emerged with a more public role advocating for veterans serving during the global war on terror.

In August, the Navy commissioned Murphy as a reserve lieutenant commander. He hasn't deployed to combat, but he makes rounds at National Naval Hospital in Bethesda, Md., counseling wounded Marines, sailors and their families.

Murphy urged caregivers to learn more about traumatic brain injury, use scientifically based treatment models, ensure the confidentiality of therapy for those in uniform, monitor the effects of treatment on the soldier's family and study the unique culture and slang of the military to be better clinicians.

He said clinicians should inspect their politics and attitudes toward the wars as a "matter of examining yourself."

"If you have trouble leaving them at home, then don't treat soldiers," he said.

The Combat Stress Intervention Program has focused on Army reservists and National Guardsmen returning from war. Today, Highlands Hospital in Connellsville and Conemaugh Valley Memorial Hospital in Johnstown have program-directed initiatives reaching into surrounding counties to give veterans the help they need.

"Part of what we teach the local communities is that combat is a life-changing experience," said program co-director and professor Elizabeth Bennett. She noted that many local veterans are in the Guard and Reserve units and are in their 30s or 40s.

"They often have families and mortgages to pay, children to raise. Their jobs often involve supervising others," she said. "Often, they are not the ones who reach out for help, so the community needs to know how to help them."

Carl Prine can be reached at cprine@tribweb.com or 412-320-7826.

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