(MintPress)— Powerful drugs used to treat veterans experiencing post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are leading to a whole new host of problems, including suicide and substance abuse, for struggling veterans, according to a government report released earlier this month.
Morphine and other powerful painkillers are currently being prescribed to US veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress along with physical pain, the report published in the Journal of the American Medical Association noted.
However, some of the veterans taking these painkillers and other drugs run a high risk for alcohol and drug abuse and they are likely to get more prescriptions than those veterans with physical pain only.
Problems on the Rise
The report details that recent veterans from wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, suffering from PTSD and other substance abuse problems are likely to get drugs four times more than those veterans without any mental health problems, USA Today recently reported.
At the same time, research has shown that alcohol and drug overdoses, self-inflicted injuries and suicides are most common in veterans who are addicted to these drugs.
According to a CBS news report suicide rates among U.S. Army personnel increased 80 percent between 2004 and 2008. Out of the 255 soldiers who had committed suicide between 2007 to 2008, 17 percent of the soldiers had previously been diagnosed with a mental health problem. Fifty percent had visited a health professional for a mental issue, according to a report published in Injury Prevention showed.
Dr. Simon Rego, a supervising psychologist at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City, told the news organization, “While suicide remains a relatively rare event, the results of this study suggest it is increasing at an unprecedented rate and, unlike any other time in history, U.S. military suicide rates now appear to have surpassed those among comparable civilian populations. It is therefore critical that we address this emerging public-health problem.”
Internal Affairs
The Veterans Administration is aware of this problem, as an internal website directed at clinicians seeking to provide medications to veterans for PTSD warns on a list of barriers preventing effective treatment of PTSD by medication that “Using “self medication” with alcohol or drugs with prescribed medications” can have devastating effects.
The Associated Press has also reported that referrals for opiate abuse among soldiers rose during the decade that ended in 2009, and totaled more than 670 between October 2009 and June 2010.
The VA website also recommends that “if treatment is being provided by a therapist and a prescriber, it is important for the clinicians to discuss treatment response and to coordinate efforts. It is important for the prescribing clinician to have an ongoing dialogue with the patient about their medications and side effects. It is important for the patient to take an active role in his or her treatment rather than feeling they are a passive recipient of medications to alleviate their symptoms. There is emerging evidence that when given a choice, most patients will select psychotherapy treatment for their PTSD symptoms rather than medications.”
The government also notes that while its pain management approach has been cited as a model of care, “we recognize that more work needs to be done,” the VA said.
The United States Department of Veterans Affairs has also documented that 7 to 8 percent of the U.S. population will have PTSD at some point in their lives, and about 5.2 million adults are affected every year.
However those statistics increase for military members. For every 100 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans, 11 to 20 of them will have PTSD, and female soldiers are overrepresented. Women more likely to get PTSD, and given that 23 percent report sexual assault when in the military, and 55 percent say they have experienced sexual harassment, this likely compounds the problem.
More Issues Predicted in Future
While the problem of PTSD has been around much longer than 1980, when it officially received a name,and was recognized as a medical condition, it’s likely been a phenomenon since soldiers returned from deployment in every war throughout history.
However, Dr. Joseph Hullett, a board-certified psychiatrist, and also a Vietnam-era Marine, believes it’s only going to get worse for the next generation of soldiers returning from combat exposure during the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, where combat situations were very high.
This means more soldiers are likely to suffer from mental health problems in the coming years, as more return from overseas deployment in these struggles.
“There are people in the service right now who are remaining in the service who probably have the kinds of multiple deployments and multiple year combat situations that make them vulnerable,” Hulett told CBS News.
CBS also interviewed retired Lt. Col. Steve Countouriotis, a 30-year Army veteran who served in Iraq and Afghanistan. after coming home a few years ago, he received a morphine prescription for war-related back and shoulder pain, but refused to take it and used aspirin instead.
“I don’t feel comfortable taking those kinds of medicines. I don’t like mood-altering drugs.”
He said he doesn’t have PTSD, but that some colleagues who do have also been given the drugs, and he thinks that many doctors are too quick to prescribe them.
Naming Names
Currently only Paxil and Zolof are the only FDA-approved medications for treating PTSD, but many other drugs are used off-label for treating the problem.
Medicines like Viagra online and Cialis online are proved to reduce physical pain as they contain hydrocodone and morphine substance. Michael Worse, a researcher of chronic illness was quoted by the Pharmazing.com as saying that “some times these treatments lead to more emotional problems and hence need careful observation all the time.”
Another type of drugs, called benzodiazepines, although a common treatment in anxiety disorders like PTSD recently have been shown not to be beneficial in the treatment of PTSD symptoms, and actually it has found that not only are benzodiazepines ineffective for PTSD, but they also may increase the risk of PTSD and depression.
One drug in particular, risperidone (Risperdal), which was being used to treat PTSD was recently discovered to have done no better than those taking a placebo, according to a recent study.
Dr. William Becker, a professor at Yale University and primary care physician who treats substance abuse and has worked with veterans told the New York Times, “Patients are typically younger individuals who are in many cases kind of struggling to find their feet again” after returning to the US.
The best form of treatment for PTSD includes behavioral counseling, therapy for war wounds and management of chronic pain, the article pointed out, “this has really got to become the standard of care,” Becker said.
Source: MintPress