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Nov 12, 2009 3:37 pm US/Central
North Texas Family Feeling The Effects Of PTSD
By Melissa Newton
NORTH TEXAS (CBS 11 / TXA 21) ―
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A member of the U.S. military patrols the villate of Al-Aswad in the Diyala province northeast of Baghdad.
Ali Yussef/AFP/Getty Images
Joel McCartney is a proud and patriotic father. But when his 22-year-old son, Joel Jr., returned home from Iraq this summer, McCartney realized something had changed.
"He has nightmares, he'll break out in a cold sweat," McCartney explained.
Army counselors diagnosed the North Texas soldier with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The anxiety disorder is triggered by being involved in or witness to a traumatic event and can have long-lasting effects.
"Intrusive memories of the event, whatever the trauma was, hyper arousal, always being on edge. If someone comes up behind you, you jump," psychologist Alina Suris said of PTSD symptoms. The doctor at the Dallas VA Hospital and UT Southwestern went on to say, "Nightmares are another common symptom of PTSD."
The disorder has become almost commonplace in our nation's military. "Folks are getting redeployed over and over and over," Suris said. "Research shows the more exposure you have to trauma; the more likely you are to get PTSD."
As a concerned father McCartney said, "When they [service people] come back, I don't think there is adequate care for our military personnel."
Currently, the U.S. Army has nearly 550,000 active duty soldiers and just over 400 psychiatrists to treat them.
"My son is having to wait months at a time before he even sees someone, to talk to a license counselor," explained McCartney.
The former Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, Dr. S. Ward Casscells, said, "It's the face-to-face counseling that's so important for preventing and treating PTSD."
Despite his diagnosis, Joel Jr. will once again be deployed in February. "There is no way he is prepared, mentally, to do the job they want him to do right now," McCartney said of his son.
Former Gen. Eric Shinseki, now the secretary of the Veterans Affairs, said he's working to improve the agency's ability to cope with the increasing numbers of troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan with mental health problems.
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