DCoE Blog

• Deployment Health Clinical Center Delivers a Specialized Care Program Session for Military Women

  Posted by DCoE Strategic Communications on March 30, 2009

  Last week the Deployment Health Clinical Center (DHCC) completed its Specialized Care Program (SCP) Track II’s first all women session for a group of seven military women. DHCC has been offering the SCP Track II, a three-week, outpatient, integrative care program for post-traumatic stress symptoms, for three and a half years. The program is specifically formulated for the military population. Employing evidence-based treatments for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), the program focuses on strength-based resiliency and on teaching participants to better understand and learn skills to manage their physical and mental stress reactions. There is strong empirical support for exposure-based psychotherapies. For example, a research study in which World War II veterans experiencing severe PTSD were provided exposure therapy resulted in profound improvements. It is valuable for traumatized veterans to talk about what happened to them, examine ways they are affected and learn new methods of coping with and mastering the ...

  Categories: Women, Treatment   |   Comments (0)

• CDP Offers Ohio April Training for Civilian Mental Health Providers

  Posted by Dr. William Brim on March 17, 2009

  Recently I blogged about the Center for Deployment Psychology’s (CDP) one week course titled Addressing the Psychological Health of Warriors and Their Families (see CDP Offers One Week Training for Civilian Mental Health Providers, January 21, 2009). I am proud to announce more details about the course offering that is scheduled for April. The CDP has partnered with Wright Patterson Medical Group, WrightStateUniversity’s School of Professional Psychology and the Ohio Department of Mental Health to offer our one week training in Columbus, Ohio the week of April 20, 2009. This course is open to civilian, licensed mental health providers who work or might work with military members and/or their families. The one week training course includes one day spent on assessment of traumatic brain injury (TBI) and understanding the impact of TBI on the service member and their families; a half day spent on educating the providers regarding military culture ...

  Categories: Training   |   Comments (0)

• Brig. Gen. Sutton Discusses Brain Injuries, Suicide Prevention and Medical Evaluations

  Posted by David Egner on March 9, 2009

  Members of the military who believe they may have had a concussion should always get a prompt medical evaluation – even if they think they don’t need it, according to Brig. Gen. Loree K. Sutton, M.D.

  Sutton is director of the Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury and is the highest ranking psychiatrist in the U.S. Army. She was interviewed for the March 5 episode of “Dot Mil Docs,” a Web radio production of the Military Health System. The interview can be heard at http://www.health.mil/MediaRoom/default.aspx?id=455&currentPg=1

  “Get a brief medical assessment and determine whether you’re really in need of a little rest or whether you can go back,” Sutton said on the program. “It’s certainly possible to be exposed to an explosion and have no visible injury” so it is important “to document what has happened if an individual has felt dazed or confused.”

  Categories: Traumatic Brain Injury, Suicide, Psychological Health   |   Comments (2)

• About Traumatic Brain Injuries

  Posted by Kathy Helmick on March 4, 2009

  March is Brain Injury Awareness Month and this provides an important opportunity to discuss issues that our warriors and their families face, including the three different categories of traumatic brain injury (TBI): concussion, moderate TBI and severe TBI. Depending upon the degree of TBI, service members can face problems related to attention, memory, behavioral and physical issues, all of which can affect how they function and feel on a daily basis. Concussion, also known as mild TBI, can be difficult to detect. Concussions are caused by events that entail a blow or jolt to the head, where the person does not necessarily become unconscious. Experiencing multiple concussions within a short period of time can provoke more severe damage than might be warranted by the last injury suffered alone, so it is important for those who have experienced concussions to seek help. Moderate TBI results in an event-related period of ...

  Categories: Traumatic Brain Injury   |   Comments (0)