...Over 58,000 Americans have died in the Vietnam War. We may have won the battle, but it was only the beginning. Many survivors have been traumatized for what they have seen, done, and experienced. Ron Kovic happens to be a well-known Vietnam Veteran, who is paralyzed from chest down. He wrote a book called Born on the Fourth of July to show his point of view on what truly happens during the Vietnam War. Kovic tells us that people do not know what war really is until they experienced it. After he returns back home from the war, he thought he would be treated as a hero but people saw him completely different, as if they were disappointed in him. His concerns with today’s generation are that there will possibly be another war like Vietnam but with Afghanistan and to warn the young adults who are joining the military what they are exactly signing up for. After Kovic was release from the military, he wished that he could have heard a person who got injured from War to tell him what really happens, and that is his goal today. Ron Kovic became a protester today because, how he was treated in the hospital,...
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...Annotated Bibliography Topic: War Related Post Traumatic Stress Disorder Sub Topics: Chronic PTSD in Vietnam Veterans PTSD in Iraq War Veterans SOURCE 1: What is PTSD? Retrieved on 13 Nov. 2011 http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/pages/what-is-ptsd.asp UNDERSTANDING PTSD Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is an anxiety disorder that can occur after you have been through a traumatic event. A traumatic event is something horrible and scary that you see or that happens to you. During this type of event, you think that your life or others' lives are in danger. You may feel afraid or feel that you have no control over what is happening. Anyone who has gone through a life-threatening event can develop PTSD. These events can include: * Combat or military exposure * Child sexual or physical abuse * Terrorist attacks * Sexual or physical assault * Serious accidents, such as a car wreck. * Natural disasters, such as a fire, tornado, hurricane, flood, or earthquake. After the event, you may feel scared, confused, or angry. If these feelings don't go away or they get worse, you may have PTSD. These symptoms may disrupt your life, making it hard to continue with your daily activities. How does PTSD develop? All people with PTSD have lived through a traumatic event that caused them to fear for their lives, see horrible things, and feel helpless. Strong emotions caused by the event create changes in the brain that may result in PTSD...
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...Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in Vietnam War Veterans COMM/156 4/14/2013 Professor Marsha Parker PTSD is an anxiety disorder classified as a mental illness caused by exposure to terrifying or life threatening events. During the time of war, people get exposed to devastating experiences such as sexual abuse, witnessing murder of family members or familiar people, and other horrors of war. As a result, the victims suffer from mental disorders since the horrible experiences are forever ingrained in their mind. Bearing in mind that bad memories are rarely erased, the experiences can be compared to a horror movie that is often played in the mind and constantly frightens the victim to death. On one hand the victim celebrates survival but on the other hand the experiences haunt one through night mares or flashbacks. The victim remains constantly on edge and is easily startled. Some common feelings include intense guilt and some time numbness- all signs of posttraumatic stress disorder (TMP, 2012). A research finding by Bruce Dohrenwend and colleagues from New York State Psychiatric Institute and Columbia’s Letter Carrier School of Public Health, shows that traumatic experiences during war predicted the onset of PTSD in Vietnam veterans (Mikulak, 2013). We will examine the PTSD in Vietnam War veterans. Human existence has been always exposed to traumatic incidences of various kinds. For instance, attacks by lions or even the twentieth century terrorist attacks to...
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...Suicide of Vietnam Veterans The deaths that were experienced in Vietnam due to Agent Orange and other jungle diseases have become well known by the general public. However, it is suicide that has resulted in the deaths of over 150,000 Vietnam soldiers during and after the war. An enormous amount of suicides resulted from what most people call “protecting our country”. The Vietnam War brought more than fifty-eight thousand deaths and is to some one of the darkest battles in United States history. If not killed during the war, many believe any Vietnam veteran would return home great and proud. But this is not the case. Many Vietnam veterans have committed suicide before, during, and after the war. Not only have these men and woman risked their lives for our country, but now, return different people and can not comprehend whether or not to continue their lives. Many people believe we win wars, when in actuality, no one does, especially those who serve in the armed forces (Suicide Wall, 11-10-2000). The Vietnam and other wars have mentally and sometimes physically dismembered many veterans. Another factor that plays a role in a war-related suicide is the addition of many on-site diseases such as defoliants, Agent Orange in particular. Made up of equal parts N-Butyl Ester 2,4,-D and N-Butyl Ester 2,4,5,-T, Agent Orange made many Vietnam soldiers go insane (Vietnam Veterans, 11-10-2000). This atrocious chemical lead and still today leads to death, deformation, and diabetes. Dr...
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...When most Americans hear the term PTSD the think of the young soldier who has just come home from the horrors of war. Few think of what happens to these veterans as they age and become elderly men and women. Over the past 30 years treatment options and protocols for posttraumatic stress disorder have become more formalized and reliant on evidence. Many of these established PTSD protocol driven interventions were originally developed to help Vietnam veterans while they were younger men and women. The problem is that these Vietnam veterans are now in their late sixties and early seventies and there is no current established therapy for treating aging war veterans. The purpose of conducting this study is to focus on the aging war veterans and...
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...UNIVERSITY SCHOOL OF SOCIAL WORK ------------------------------------------------- POLICY BRIEF VETERAN TREATMENT COURT SHOULD BE EXPANDED TO THE COMMON PLEAS COURT OF CUYAHOGA COUNTY TONY D. MORRIS PREPARED FOR: Honorable John J. Russo Administrative and Presiding Judge Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court July 1, 2014 SWK 300: SOCIAL WELFARE POLICY PROFESSOR MICHAEL A. DOVER SPRING 2014 GOAL STATEMENT The sole purpose of this policy brief is to deliver concrete and measurement evidences that Veteran Treatment Courts (VTC) promotes public safety by diverting veterans with addictions and/or mental illness into a voluntary specialized court as oppose to the traditional criminal justice system. At present the Cleveland Veteran Treatment docket is only available to veterans that reside in the City of Cleveland. By expanded the court to Cuyahoga County Common Pleas Court, veterans would have access to the resources available, especially at the county level. There are 38 cities and 19 villages in Cuyahoga County. According to the United States Census Bureau and there are 90,753 veterans residing in Cuyahoga County and increasing as service members from Operation Enduring Freedom, Operation Iraqi Freedom & Operation New Dawn (OEF,OIF,OND) begin to return and reintegrate back to civilian life. The VTC has proven to be smart, cost effective ventures that assist veterans on the road to recovery, effectively and successfully reducing recidivism. SCOPE OF THE PROBLEM ...
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...Veterans in the United States of America face very real problems when they come back home to the lives they had before their service. Often times they will appear emotionally detached from their loved ones, they lack social behavior, and they may even act violently or out of character in some other way. This can be interpreted common actions of someone who has just been in a warzone for a prolonged period, but the strange way they act is often defined as a symptom of some sort or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder similar to what you would see in victims of rape or violent crimes. The PTSD experienced in these violent crime victims and veterans are not the same the way each of the symptoms line up side to side is enough proof that the experiences are clearly different fundamentally. The tension is that not all veterans are afraid of what they saw and reliving it over and over because they have no choice. The problem lies in them missing the war experience rather than trying forget it. Veteran’s face serious social obstacles acclimating back into the society of the U.S. and as a culture we have become increasingly infatuated with individualisms ideals which makes it harder for them to build rapport with their community. It is necessary to explore how we as a culture are responsible for what happens to our veterans not just when they’re overseas but also when they come home. We also must examine more abstract ways of examining troubled veterans because there is an egregious amounts...
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...Military Veterans From research studies, military veterans aren’t well compensated for their service in the military. Not only are they not well compensated, there were many combat soldiers coming home with anger issues, PTSD, depression, and other psychological problems. According to research, half of the homeless individuals are military veterans not just an opinion but it’s a proven fact. Veterans are often not honored, as they should be. Why aren’t they? Another question is why aren’t our veterans not well taken care of? No health insurance for veterans First, scientific studies show that working age veterans don’t have health insurance. According to Genevieve Kenney, a senior fellow with the Urban Institute and co-author of the report...
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...Posttraumatic Stress Disorder Necessary Improvements the United States Department of Veterans Affairs and United States Department of Defense Must Make Abstract Posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a mental anxiety disorder, affects 13% to 20% of armed force members returning from Operation Enduring Freedom (OEF) and Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) (Hoge, et. al, 2004), in addition to a large population of Vietnam Veterans. Within the past 32 years, awareness of this disorder has escalated and the realism of the severity of this disorder has been noticed. Efforts to screen and treat PTSD in military veterans have been established by the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Screening is conducted once military personnel return from deployment and treatments including Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing, Exposure Therapy, and medications are used to relieve the symptoms of PTSD. These screening and treatment methods are evaluated and s suggestion for improvement is made. Necessary Improvements the United States Department of Veterans Affairs and the United States Department of Defense Must Make With Regards to Posttraumatic Stress Disorder In current political debate, the United States is arguing where budget cuts should be made and how the U.S. should go about spending money. The U.S. military is consistently brought up in these considerations. In such considerations, topics such as downsizing the military and the...
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...The Unseen Wound Salvador Siegel COMM/112 May 17, 2012 Rick De La Pena The Unseen Wound Many soldiers returning home from war have many obstacles to overcome both physical and mental. Most soldiers are not aware of a certain condition that they might have developed while deployed in a war zone. This condition is called Traumatic Brain Injury, also known as TBI. It is an injury that is not found on the outside of the body but rather internal, therefore it is called the Unseen Wound. Even though it’s unseen, TBI is real and affects a large percentage of veterans returning from war and test results show that an average of 46 percent of soldiers have TBI. Traumatic brain injury, the signature wound of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, is doubly cruel: it leaves many victims emotionally shattered and cognitively crippled. But because mild and moderate brain injuries do not show up on CT or other imaging devices, doctors and even family members are often skeptical that any real damage exists. TBI is real and affects a large percentage of veterans returning from war. “Consistent with the designation of TBI as one of the signature injuries of the war theaters in Iraq and Afghanistan, 46% of the returning veterans recruited for this project screened positive for a deployment-related TBI” (Morissette, Woodward, & Kimbrel, Meyer, Kruse, 2011, p. 346). I have deployed multiple times to Iraq and Afghanistan and have sustained injuries in result of Improvised Explosive Devices (IED’s)...
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...This is a research paper on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in which it explains that the treatment of this mental condition goes beyond regular mental health treatment. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: The War at Home Regina N. Chance Kwoya Fagin, Professor ENG215 Research and Writing 7 August 2010 Post Traumatic Stress Disorder: Takes Special Medical Care The government is awesome at getting men ready for war, but they can’t quite get them back to civilian life and a humble heart. - JUNIOR ENLISTED MARINE, POST-IRAQ After we came back, many of us were only back in body. Our souls stayed over there. – ARMY COMBAT ENGINEER, POST-IRAQ Transition can mean the big picture of how a warrior has to try to adjust back into society, but the short term is very critical, from when a warrior leaves the battlefield to when they hit the streets at home. If there’s one thing I learned from my experiences, it was that there was no transition at all. –VIETNAM VETERAN Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) has become the major medical issue with our soldiers returning from the war in Iraq and Afghanistan. For many soldiers, it is a badge of honor to have served but for most, it is a start to an endless battle of finding the courage to continue to serve or be labeled an unfit soldier for the military and useless to their family. PTSD affects not only the soldier’s way of life but the core of who the soldier is. For this...
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...the numbers are as follows: • Operation Iraqi Freedom (OIF) and Enduring Freedom (OEF): About 11-20 out of every 100 Veterans (or between 11-20%) who served in OIF or OEF have PTSD in a given year. Gulf War (Desert Storm): About 12 out of every 100 Gulf War Veterans (or 12%) have PTSD in a given year. • Vietnam War: About 15 out of every 100 Vietnam Veterans (or 15%) were currently diagnosed with PTSD at the time of the most recent study in the late 1980s, the National Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Study (NVVRS). It is estimated that about 30 out of every 100 (or 30%) of Vietnam Veterans have had PTSD in their lifetime. (How Common is PTSD? (n.d.) Many have tried to come up with an effective treatment to help our service members suffering through PTSD. Although there are many types of treatment therapy and medication, this article will focus on using forms of meditation like Transcendental Meditation (TM) or yoga to help veterans suffering through PTSD. Veterans with PTSD There are many forms of treatment, the most common being a combination of therapy and medication. However as in all treatments in psychology, not all people respond well and others don’t find it effective. This causes many veterans to stop seeking treatment altogether. Some don’t even choose to report that they suffer from PTSD. PTSD which affects about one in five veterans, is typically triggered by the experience of a terrifying or life-threatening event. Symptoms may include flashbacks, nightmares...
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...Stress Disorder (PTSD) in soldiers. Posttraumatic stress disorder (PSTD), classified as an anxiety disorder, has become increasingly important because of wars overseas, natural disasters, and domestic violence. Typically the individual with PTSD persistently avoids all thoughts, emotions and discussion of the stressor event and may experience amnesia for it. However, the event is commonly relived by the individual through intrusive, recurrent recollections, flashbacks and nightmares. The characteristic symptoms are considered acute if lasting less than three months, chronic if persisting three months or more, and with delayed onset if the symptoms first occur after six months or some years later. PTSD is distinct from the briefer acute stress disorder, and can cause clinical impairment in significant areas of functioning. We will be discussing how PTSD affects the soldiers coming from war, their behaviors, and interaction with society and suicide incidence. Keywords: PTSD, anxiety disorder, soldiers. Post Traumatic Stress disorder in soldier As of today a great number of soldiers that have returned from the Iraq war are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). The most current military combats in Iraq, which have involved the ground combats as well as air battle embarked by the United States since the war in Vietnam almost 50 years ago, bring up very essential inquiries about the effect of the experience on the mental health of member of the military services, who...
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...started and how it has evolved over the years to become the entity it is today, serving our nations veterans. I will also discuss how the Veteran’s Administration has been plagued with many scandals throughout its existence, from when it was known as the Veterans Bureau during the early 1920’s and also the many issues that the Veterans Administration has dealt with over the years to include those that were involved and their official capacity in wrong doings. This paper will look at how the Veterans administration has tried to make changes to support the increased number of Veterans after many of our past wars and some of the difficulties veterans from the Vietnam War have faced to receive care and benefits that were exposed to Agent Orange. I will also looked at the many problems veterans have faced over the years to include most recent allegation that the VA has gone through since the earlier part of this year and the changes that has taken place to correct the problem. According to an article written by CNN, during the end of the Revolutionary War Congress was supposed to pay those veterans that were disabled during the war, but the service members individual states were left up to the task, leaving only a few thousand to receive any type of payment pay. Congress establishes the Veterans Bureau which was to help administer assistance to veterans of World War I. In 1921 President Harding appointed Colonel Charles R. Forbes as the head of a newly established...
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...Veteran Benefits; Then and Now Veterans have given their lives for their country, it is only right that we provide for them after this service has ended. Laws were passed to provide benefits and administration to give these benefits.Veteran Benefits, not only provide the monetary benefits as originally planned, but now it also provides medical care, and burial services. There has been a tremendous improvement to the services provided to our military personnel, however veterans are still lacking many benefits and the quality of the benefits already given is not sufficient. Veteran Benefits are services provided to those who have served in any branch of the U.S military, to help them live normally after the horrors they saw and encountered during their career in the military. All veterans receive some benefits for serving such as medical services and burial, but there is also benefits for mental disabilities such as PTSD, or physical ones such as cancer or losing a limb. Veteran Benefits pertain to many people and help many families including mine. Veteran Benefits relate to my family because we have had many people in the service. My grandfather, who served in...
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