For the last 15 years, we have been fighting a war on terror. America has deployed its service members time and time again to numerous locations and expects them to function normally after multiple combat rotations. Recent wars, more so than earlier wars have had a greater effect on the mental stability of the service men and women within Special Operations Forces (SOF). If United States Special Operations Command (USSOCOM) expects its people to charge head first into battle, it must make valiant efforts to take care of them. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI) are the core diagnosis of routine deployments within combat theaters. Many of our special operation soldiers, sailors, airmen, and marines complain of head trauma due to improvised explosive devices, certain weapons, or accidents. Since our SOF men and women do not receive the proper treatment to heal these invisible wounds, they self-medicate with either drugs (both illegal and pharmaceutical) or alcohol.
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The Department of Defense has incorporated steps to remedy the issues of our force. The Regiment has embedded Behavioral Health at the Group level consisting of psychologists and psychiatrists, but is this repairing or concealing the real problem? The United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) has not done enough to counter the significant mental effects years of continuous combat has placed on our service members. Shell shock, battle fatigue, and gulf war syndrome are only some of the names associated with PTSD. The idea is not new that extreme amounts of trauma lead to mental disorders. In fact, this same disease during the Civil War was labeled by the American Doctor Jacob Mendez Da Costa as the “Da Costa’s Syndrome” (Iribarren et al. 2005, 503-512). The Anxiety and Depression As-sociation of America defines PTSD as “a serious potentially debilitating condition that can occur in people who have experienced or witnessed a natural disaster, serious accident, terrorist inci-dent, sudden death of a loved one, war, violent personal assault such as rape, or other life-threatening events" (Anxiety and Depression Association of America). The Department of Vet-erans Affairs conducted studies comparing PTSD among Vietnam veterans to Iraq or Afghani-stan veterans where there was a resounding increase in reported cases from 15.2% to 30% today (Department of Veteran's Affairs, 2015). The USSOCOM Preservation of the Force and Family Wave IV Needs Assessment and Program Evaluation states that 17.9% of SOF has been diag-nosed with PTSD. Of these, 48% saw a teammate killed or physically injured, 13% were person-ally wounded or physically injured, 71% saw the bodies of dead soldiers or civilians, 60% per-sonally witnessed others being killed, and 55% personally killed others in combat. That survey goes further by stating that 8.4% of active duty SOF have been diagnosed with major to severe depression (United States, 2016). Research from the Anxiety and Depression Association of America has recently shown that PTSD among military personnel may be a physical brain injury, specifically of damaged tissue, caused by blasts during combat (Anxiety and Depression Associ-ation of America). The USSOCOM POTFF survey also proved that of the 17.9% of active duty SOF who had high and moderate PTSD symptoms; all were less resilient, more depressed, more socially isolated, and endorsed a slightly greater risk of alcohol abuse (United States, 2016). An-other trend associated with multiple combat deployments and PTSD is traumatic brain injury. The DOD defines TBI as a traumatically induced structural injury and/or physiological disrup-tion of brain function as a result of external force that is indicated by new onset or worsening of at least one of the following clinical signs, immediately following the event: 1) Any period of loss, or a decreased level, of consciousness 2) Any loss of memory for events immediately be-fore or after the injury 3) Any alteration in mental state at the time of the injury 4) Neurological deficits (weakness, loss of balance, change in vision, aphasia, etc.) that may or may not be tran-sient 5) intracranial lesion (Rosene, 2013). It has been called the invisible disability because it can have no outward symptoms, and can impact an individual's ability to understand what is happening to them. There has been an increase within the military on studying and diagnosing
The Department of Defense has incorporated steps to remedy the issues of our force. The Regiment has embedded Behavioral Health at the Group level consisting of psychologists and psychiatrists, but is this repairing or concealing the real problem? The United States Army Special Operations Command (USASOC) has not done enough to counter the significant mental effects years of continuous combat has placed on our service members. Shell shock, battle fatigue, and gulf war syndrome are only some of the names associated with PTSD. The idea is not new that extreme amounts of trauma lead to mental disorders. In fact, this same disease during the Civil War was labeled by the American Doctor Jacob Mendez Da Costa as the “Da Costa’s Syndrome” (Iribarren et al. 2005, 503-512). The Anxiety and Depression As-sociation of America defines PTSD as “a serious potentially debilitating condition that can occur in people who have experienced or witnessed a natural disaster, serious accident, terrorist inci-dent, sudden death of a loved one, war, violent personal assault such as rape, or other life-threatening events" (Anxiety and Depression Association of America). The Department of Vet-erans Affairs conducted studies comparing PTSD among Vietnam veterans to Iraq or Afghani-stan veterans where there was a resounding increase in reported cases from 15.2% to 30% today (Department of Veteran's Affairs, 2015). The USSOCOM Preservation of the Force and Family Wave IV Needs Assessment and Program Evaluation states that 17.9% of SOF has been diag-nosed with PTSD. Of these, 48% saw a teammate killed or physically injured, 13% were person-ally wounded or physically injured, 71% saw the bodies of dead soldiers or civilians, 60% per-sonally witnessed others being killed, and 55% personally killed others in combat. That survey goes further by stating that 8.4% of active duty SOF have been diagnosed with major to severe depression (United States, 2016). Research from the Anxiety and Depression Association of America has recently shown that PTSD among military personnel may be a physical brain injury, specifically of damaged tissue, caused by blasts during combat (Anxiety and Depression Associ-ation of America). The USSOCOM POTFF survey also proved that of the 17.9% of active duty SOF who had high and moderate PTSD symptoms; all were less resilient, more depressed, more socially isolated, and endorsed a slightly greater risk of alcohol abuse (United States, 2016). An-other trend associated with multiple combat deployments and PTSD is traumatic brain injury. The DOD defines TBI as a traumatically induced structural injury and/or physiological disrup-tion of brain function as a result of external force that is indicated by new onset or worsening of at least one of the following clinical signs, immediately following the event: 1) Any period of loss, or a decreased level, of consciousness 2) Any loss of memory for events immediately be-fore or after the injury 3) Any alteration in mental state at the time of the injury 4) Neurological deficits (weakness, loss of balance, change in vision, aphasia, etc.) that may or may not be tran-sient 5) intracranial lesion (Rosene, 2013). It has been called the invisible disability because it can have no outward symptoms, and can impact an individual's ability to understand what is happening to them. There has been an increase within the military on studying and diagnosing