Ecstacy Can Treat Trauma Patients - The Independent
It said that the drug had a ‘dramatic effect’ on people who suffered post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and who did not respond to other treatments. Read more.
VA Simplifies Access to Health Care and Benefits for Veterans with PTSD
WASHINGTON – Department of Veterans Affairs News Release
Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki announced a critical step forward in providing an easier process for Veterans seeking health care and disability compensation for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), with the publication of a final regulation in the Federal Register.
“This nation has a solemn obligation to the men and women who have honorably served this country and suffer from the often devastating emotional wounds of war,” said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. “This final regulation goes a long way to ensure that Veterans receive the benefits and services they need.”
By publishing a final regulation in the Federal Register to simplify the process for a Veteran to claim service connection for PTSD, VA reduces the evidence needed if the trauma claimed by a Veteran is related to fear of hostile military or terrorist activity and is consistent with the places, types, and circumstances of the Veteran’s service.
This science-based regulation relies on evidence that concluded that a Veteran’s deployment to a war zone is linked to an increased risk of PTSD.
Under the new rule, VA would not require corroboration of a stressor related to fear of hostile military or terrorist activity if a VA doctor confirms that the stressful experience recalled by a Veteran adequately supports a diagnosis of PTSD and the Veteran's symptoms are related to the claimed stressor.
Previously, claims adjudicators were required to corroborate that a non-combat Veteran actually experienced a stressor related to hostile military activity. This final rule simplifies the development that is required for these cases.
VA expects this rulemaking to decrease the time it takes VA to decide access to care and claims falling under the revised criteria. More than 400,000 Veterans currently receiving compensation benefits are service connected for PTSD. Combined with VA’s shorter claims form, VA’s new streamlined, science-based regulation allows for faster and more accurate decisions that also expedite access to medical care and other benefits for Veterans.
PTSD is a medically recognized anxiety disorder that can develop from seeing or experiencing an event that involves actual or threatened death or serious injury to which a person responds with intense fear, helplessness or horror, and is not uncommon among war Veterans.
Disability compensation is a tax-free benefit paid to a Veteran for disabilities that are a result of -- or made worse by -- injuries or diseases associated with active service.
For additional information, go to www.va.gov or call VA’s toll free benefits number at 1-800-827-1000.
ISTSS 2010 President-Elect and Board Member Election
The election will take place by electronic ballot, which will open on August 5, 2010. Members will receive an e-mail with full instructions on how to access the voting Web site. Click here for details.
Borderline Personality Associated with High Incidence of Trauma
It is estimated that between 60% and 70% of those diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder have histories of extensive trauma within their families of origin. This includes physical abuse, sexual abuse, psychological abuse, and neglect (American Academy of Experts in Traumatic Stress, 1997).
Waller (1984) notes that trauma, as reported by a group of eating disordered females, if occurring prior to the age of 14, were more likely to have a diagnosis of Borderline Personality Disorder.
Kernberg (1975) asserts that an early "borderline organization," natural to early development, begins during the first three years of life. He says the infant's fragile ego, with its inability to integrate "good" and "bad,' has a wedge driven into it by injurious stimuli from the environment, making the split deeper between the good and the bad. This places the individual on course for a Borderline Personality Disorder as an adult.
Shouldn't Most Borderlines Have PTSD?
If most Borderlines have a history of trauma, shouldn't most Borderlines have PTSD?
There are many clinicians who would want to look for Complex PTSD existing concurrently with Borderline Personality Disorder. Complex PTSD is a diagnosis not made official in the Diagnostic Statistical Manual (DSM), but is used among many clinicians who work with individuals with long periods of childhood abuse. Complex PTSD and the PTSD found in the DSM are similar, yet have significant differences (Whealin, Sloan, 2007).
Differences between PTSD and Complex PTSD
The PTSD as discussed in the DSM (acute trauma PTSD) is caused by an intense, life threatening traumatic event of limited duration. Complex PTSD develops in response to a perpetrator who has traumatized the victim over a long period of time.
Acute trauma PTSD usually develops during adulthood, after the personality has developed. Complex PTSD may develop during adulthood (as in Domestic Violence), but it commonly develops among abused children, when the personality is less developed and the individual is likely to feel more helpless and captive.
Read more at Suite101: Borderline Personality Associated with High Incidence of Trauma http://clinical-psychology.suite101.com/article.cfm/borderline-personality-and-the-high-incidence-of-trauma#ixzz0tTQvxUPV
Earthquake Trauma: Team Works to Help Haiti Heal
"Sometimes you are just trying to forget about it," said Eugene, a 27-year-old interpreter. "But it just comes right back to your mind."
Jan. 12 marked the day a 7.0 magnitude earthquake reduced Port au Prince to rubble, killing her uncle and more than 250,000 others.
Pignon is about 85 miles north of Port au Prince. The roads there are so rough and rocky, it's actually smoother to travel by donkey than by car. But its distance from Port au Prince was not enough for the area to escape the emotional impact of January's earthquake.
"I would go like, 'Is it in my mind?' or 'What's going on with me?'" Eugene said, recalling her sleepless nights.
Post-Traumatic Stress
Eugene is not alone in her restlessness. It has been a long six months for earthquake survivors and many are healing physically, but the emotional recovery is just beginning.
A team from Regent University in Virginia Beach, Va., is training counselors to treat those Haitians struggling with Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD.
"They have assimilated to the trauma because life goes on and they have had to adapt," explained Dr. Benjamin Keyes who leads the team. "But all the memories of what went on, and all the things that they saw have never been talked about because in this country people just don't do that."
First Response Trauma Team
Keyes and his team are spending a week in Pignon to help victims discuss what they are going through.
"Knowing that we were trained to treat trauma, I wanted to come and I had a burden for the people, even after it moved from the front page of the newspaper," Regent graduate Vernicia Eure said. "I really wanted to come, and I asked God to help me keep Haiti in my heart."
Runell Washington, also a member of the trauma team, remembers watching the tragedy unfold on television.
"That kind of broke my heart to have this magnitude of devastation happen to a people and it only remain hot in the news for about a week-and-a-half or two weeks and then we were on to something else," she said. "I felt like that cry was so loud and the devastation so treacherous that we should have paid more attention and paid attention longer."
The university's work will continue in Haiti long after the trauma team leaves. Workers are counseling church leaders and also training them to treat people suffering with PTSD.
A Heart to Help Their Own
"It just amazes me every time just how much they desire to help their own people," Ryan Calhoun, another Regent volunteer, said. "They are coming here and many of them have been through several tragedies themselves, but they want to know how they can help others. They want to learn these counseling skills and take them out into their communities."
A pastor who lost his wife and children in the earthquake walks four hours to the training sessions in Pignon to learn how to help the people in his congregation.
"This is just a strong area in need and a strong area for God because here they are in the midst of this trauma and they want to reach out to each other," Keyes said. "And it's been quite a blessing."
Dr. Merrill Reese also helps lead the Regent University team.
"I would say based on the symptoms that we are hearing, [survivors] are finally coming through the shock stage and the numbing," Reese explained. "The realization that our lives have totally changed [is settling] so the timing for me couldn't be any better. It's like perfect timing."
Reason to Celebrate
Timing was critical for Pastor Jephthé Lucien, who invited the team of counselors to travel to Haiti. The earthquake triggered trauma in his 13-year-old adopted daughter so much she had to be hospitalized.
"As a father, it's been really painful," he said. "Personally for me, I have been preaching and sharing with people what they need to do when they are in a crisis. So I find out that it is easier to talk about it than go through it."
His daughter's weight dropped from 115 pounds to 62 pounds in just a matter of months. There had been no medical explanation for her weight loss until Dr. Keyes paid a visit.
"After he talked to her, he said that this was a classic case of anorexia," Lucien recalled. "But there is no way that us and our limited knowledge could have found that out."
Keyes was able to help diagnose the problem and get the girl better help.
"We have been able to get her to the University of Miami facility in Port au Prince," Keyes said. "She has two excellent surgeons from Miami. She is working with a psychologist and a nutritionist and what they are saying is that physically she is going to be well."
The days and months ahead are still critical, but Regent University trauma workers are giving the people of Pignon a reason to celebrate and worship God daily.
"Truly God is here at every corner, just waiting to reveal Himself. And not only is He waiting to do it, He is doing it," Reese said. "It is just exciting to be a part of."
Reading sessions help Haiti children through quake trauma
By Alice Speri (AFP)
PORT-AU-PRINCE — When the first story began only a handful of kids sat on the wet ground, watching and listening intently as a woman read aloud to them in the Port-au-Prince neighborhood of Tabarre.
Soon a crowd of 60 formed as curious children carrying baby siblings were joined by adults, eager for diversion from the tedium that, along with the rains, has settled into Haiti's sprawling camps since the January earthquake.
The scene repeats itself daily in the 15 tent cities where a program called Li Li Li! (Creole for Read Read Read!) works to promote literacy and help kids overcome the inevitable trauma from a catastrophe that left up to 300,000 dead.
The reader, Natacha Micourt, was an artist until the January 12 quake destroyed her studio and left her trapped under the rubble for two days. Now the 32-year-old painter earns 250 dollars a month as a Li Li Li! reader.
Micourt acts out stories of magic hats and Clifford, the big red dog, to the delight of the children, allowing them a brief escape from the grim reality of their post-quake existence.
"The kids just love it," she told AFP.
But Li Li Li! is not only about stress release, it is also an attempt to entrench a love for reading in a country where, before the earthquake, 44 percent of the population could not read or write, according to UN estimates.
"Illiteracy will go up even more after the earthquake because so many schools were destroyed," Li Li Li! coordinator Germinal Jocelyn told AFP.
Jocelyn's job is to scout out "unofficial" camps overlooked by Haitian authorities and relief organizations so the reading club can direct its efforts where they are most needed.
"NGOs don't come here, they don't even know these camps exist," she told AFP of the camp in Tabarre.
Li Li Li! is the brainchild of Michelle Karshan, an American and former spokeswoman for the government of ousted Haitian president Jean-Bertrand Aristide.
Karshan launched the initiative with two of her daughters, who also grew up in Haiti, to help them overcome their own shock after the earthquake.
"They felt powerless, but this made them feel like they were doing something," she said.
In the weeks after the quake, Karshan studied the benefits of telling stories to traumatized children, calling on friends to donate colorful books, which were vetted for appropriateness and translated into Creole.
Access the June Issue of JTS Now - Earn CE Credit
ISTSS Members - Access the June Issue, Vol. 23, Issue 3, 2010 of the Journal of Traumatic Stress (JTS). Plus - Earn Continuing Education credits - 3 CEs per issue. Click here for details.
Learn From the Masters - Master Clinician Sessions: 1.5 CE Credits Each
The ISTSS Annual Meeting brings together the leaders in the field in order to educate attendees about important topics in traumatic stress studies. In this series, we showcase several Master Clinicians who demonstrated interventions from their respective psychotherapy models with a common pseudo-patient diagnosed with combat-related PTSD. The sessions were recorded and are now available to you for CE Credit.
Don't miss this opportunity to learn from the masters and enjoy the top-notch educational opportunities offered by the premier society in traumatic stress studies while conveniently earning CE credit.
Visit the ISTSS Bookstore to purchase any of this or any of the Master Clinician Session - Plus select Pre-Meeting Institutes are also available for purchase.
Master Clinicians:
Riggs, David, PhD
Using Prolonged Exposure Therapy to Emotionally Process Traumatic Memories
Though many individuals who experience trauma such as war, terror attacks, violence and disaster will recover, those who suffer with post traumatic stress disorder may struggle for years and still be unable to regain a sense of normalcy in their lives. Prolonged Exposure therapy (PE) is one of the most effective and extensively researched approaches to treating PTSD arising from a wide variety of traumas and in individuals with varied and complex presentations including patients with multiple trauma exposures (e.g. chronic abuse, combat, etc.), extremely chronic PTSD, multiple comorbidities, and clinicians who see it as unduly harsh, inflexible, and potentially harmful. PE treatment focuses on helping the client to overcome the natural tendency to avoid distressing imaginal and n vivo exposure exercises the therapist and the client work together to approach previously avoided material and to emotionally process the event/memory by exploring changes in meaning, behavior and emotional reactions. By clinical case example, the workshop will illustrate the flexible application of the core components of PE and explore case formulation for treatment.
Cognitive Processing Therapy for the Treatment of PTSD
Kate Chard, PhD
Dr. Chard is an active researcher and she has conducted several funded studies on the treatment and etiology of PTSD. Currently Dr. Chard is exploring the efficacy of CPT with veterans with PTSD and comorbid traumatic brain injury.
A Transdiagnostic Unified Treatment for Emotional Disorders
David Barlow, PhD
Dr. Barlow has published more than 500 articles and chapters and 60 books mostly in the area of the nature and treatment of emotional disorders. He is the recipient of numerous awards, including the Distinguished Scientific Award for Applications of Psychology from the American Psychological Association.
Virtual Reality Exposure Therapy for the Treatment of PTSD
Barbara O. Rothbaum, PhD, ABPP
Dr. Barbara Olasov Rothbaum received her PhD in clinical psychology and is currently a professor in psychiatry at the Emory School of Medicine in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences and director of the Trauma and Anxiety Recovery Program at Emory. Dr. Rothbaum specializes in research on the treatment of individuals with anxiety disorders, particularly focusing on Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).
Questions?
Contact Erika Moy at ISTSS Headquarters
For many soldiers, mental trauma lingers at home
Time Magazine
Roughly one in ten soldiers returning from Iraq faces ongoing struggles due to post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression and other conditions, according to a new study published in the June issue of the Archives of Psychiatry
Read more: http://wellness.blogs.time.com/2010/06/07/for-many-soldiers-mental-trauma-lingers-at-home/#ixzz0qHKcTel2
