The impact of conflict on military veterans
How we address the impact of conflict with military veterans.
The Fighting Fit report by Dr Andrew Murrison MP, was commissioned by the prime minister, David Cameron, and published by the Department of Health in October 2010. This report highlighted the importance of veterans' mental health care within the NHS. In September 2011, the charity Combat Stress commenced offering a six-week intensive Cognitive Behavioural Therapy programme for Post Traumatic Stress Disorder at their 3 residential sites in the UK.
With cuts in the Services, seriously injured service men and women will be leaving the military over the next few years and their care will be transferred to the NHS. It is therefore important for mental health professionals to recognise military and conflict related psychopathology within the NHS mental health services. The 2005 NICE clinical guidelines on PTSD highlight trauma focussed Cognitive and Behavioural Therapy (CBT) or Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing (EMDR) as the evidential treatment of choice.
It is recognised by the British Association for Behavioural and Cognitive Psychotherapies (BABCP) that further work is needed to highlight these issues of identification and treatment for those that have suffered as a consequence of conflict in defending our national interests abroad.