More exciting news from IAVA and President Obama

Thank you Paul Rieckhoff, IAVA for your hard work on moving the DOD and VA into the computer age and toward a cooperative effort that will benefit us ALL! This new seamless sharing of information and records will: help vets, increase quality of care, decrease waiting time, slash spending and eliminate the waste of unnessasary re-tests and misdiagnosis. Here's more explaination from Mr. Rieckhoff...

"Right now, there is no easy process for transferring service members' medical records from the DOD to the VA when they leave active duty. As a result, some of our most seriously wounded troops are suffering through redundant tests, misdiagnoses, and delayed treatment. This initiative will make medical and military records electronic and transferable, meaning a more streamlined, less bureaucratic process for our injured troops.

But this isn't just a matter of eliminating red tape. This change impacts the health, and lives, of the men and women who have served our country."

Today, IAVA and the nation's leading Veterans Services Organizations stood with President Obama, Secretary Gates and Secretary Shinseki at the White House to renew the nation's commitment to our newest generation of heroes.

Fulfilling two of his campaign promises, President Obama announced his support for advance funding the VA and ensuring a seamless transition between the VA and DOD healthcare, which will have a huge impact on the lives of troops and veterans.

Can you take a minute to join IAVA in thanking President Obama, Secretary Gates and Secretary Shinseki for making veterans and their families a priority? This is an important first step to giving our veterans the health care and benefits they've earned.

Click here to watch a quick video and add your name! http://www2.iava.org/o/436/t/8492/petition.jsp?petition_KEY=1906

Troops' brain injuries inspire a new mission

USA TODAY

LANDSTUHL, Germany — It took nearly three years for the Army to understand the damage to Army Sgt. Chad Joiner's brain after a roadside explosion left him unconscious in a Humvee on June 28, 2005.

He finished his tour and returned home, struggled with headaches and memory loss, went back to Iraq and survived another bombing in February that aggravated his symptoms.

Only after arriving here at the Army's Landstuhl Regional Medical Center with an ankle injury in February did a new and aggressive screening program finally identify Joiner's brain injury and lead to treatment. "I'm just in shock that somebody is figuring out what's wrong with me," says Joiner, 26, who says his gratitude for the treatment outweighs any bitterness over the delay in diagnosing his injury.

The Pentagon debated for years whether to systematically screen troops for brain injuries such as Joiner's. A recent study by RAND Corp., a research group, says such injuries could have affected 320,000 Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans. Uncertain how aggressively to identify a wound that is still largely a mystery, the Pentagon initially resisted calls to screen all service members coming out of the battlefield. Under pressure from Congress, the Pentagon in March ordered all military branches to screen for traumatic brain injury (TBI).

By then, doctors at this key Army hospital — through which all war casualties pass on their way home — already had begun to check each of the wounded for a brain injury in an effort that could set new standards for whether such troops ever return to duty.

This is wonderful news for current troops coming out of combat. Perhaps veterans will be able to avail themselves of this technology also in the future. It certainly will help reduce the stigma of PTSD and brain trauma related injuries. Which in turn will lead to better awareness, which in turn will lead to broader search for effective solutions.

One of which is Emotional Freedom Technique. Some of the things I like about EFT are: you or your soldier can start using it TODAY! it's really inexpensive, it brings quick relief, it is drug free, it is so easy to do. And it can reverse these unseen injuries.

Side effects? Well more energy, more joy, more freedom to live a normal life, more engagement in the present, less depression, less fear, less anger, better sleep-I could go on and on but you get the idea!

thanks for the photo by foreignobsessed

The government is spending 4$ million to look at alternative healing for Vets.

Army's New PTSD Treatments: Yoga, Reiki, 'Bioenergy'

By Noah Shachtman

The military is scrambling for new ways to treat the brain injuries and post-traumatic stress of troops returning home from war. And every kind of therapy -- no matter how far outside the accepted medical form -- is being considered. The Army just unveiled a $4 million program to investigate everything from "spiritual ministry, transcendental meditation, [and] yoga" to "bioenergies such as Qi gong, Reiki, [and] distant healing" to mend the psyches of wounded troops.

As many as 17 percent of Iraq and Afghanistan veterans have some form of post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, one congressional study estimates. Nearly 3,300 troops have suffered traumatic brain injury, or TBI, according to statistics assembled last summer. And the lifetime costs of treating these ailments could pile up to as much as $35 billion, a Columbia University report guesses.

Small wonder, then, that the government is looking for alternate means to treat these injuries. The Defense Department "is dedicated to supporting evidence-based approaches to medical treatment and wants to support the use of alternative therapies if they are proven efficacious," notes a recently-issued request for proposals.

"Music, animal-facilitated therapy, art, dance/movement, massage therapy, EMDR [Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing] program evaluation, virtual reality, acupuncture, spiritual ministry, transcendental meditation, [and] yoga," might all be considered worth of the military's largess. So would "biologically-based treatments, botanicals, and nutritional supplements for enhancing cognitive function and mood in patients with trauma spectrum disorders, including TBI and/or PTSD, depression, anxiety, and/or substance dependence/abuse." Even proposals for wild-sounding "therapies using bioenergies such as Qi gong, Reiki, distant healing and acupuncture" would be accepted.

What not to say to returning vets...

"Time heals all wounds"

If you've got returning troops coming into your family, community or church, this is one cliché you will want to stay away from. In fact you may want to stay away from alot of clichés. Instead let your veteran know that you care, you don't know what they are going through, but you do want to help.

They may have PTSD which means they might feel angry, confused, embarrassed, depressed, anxious, drinking or worse, avoiding old friends, family and hangouts. But you can't know that unless you stop, take the time to ask AND listen!

Pushing through PTSD?

Kids headed out for the bus this morning, still in the dark. As I closed the door behind the last one, I heard 'GO GET MOM!'

It brought me on the run to find a motorcyclist who had slipped and slid for yards on the icy road. It was obvious she was in shock and already getting sore. But because she had no 'external' damage she refused any help of any kind. Not for herself, not for her machine. "I can handle it," she kept saying.

It seems to be an inbuilt survival mechanism for us to push on and almost a gut reaction not to appear to need help. Which makes treating PTSD very difficult. Especially with troops trained to push on, trained to overcome fears and weaknesses, trained to get the job done, not dwell on what's bothering them.

This is the point when family and friends become SO important. Listening, watching, being aware, being there without pushing, taking the time to understand what might be going on and helping to find solutions.