Army Releases Fifth Mental Health Study

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Army Releases Fifth Mental Health Study
Army News Service | Carrie McLeroy | March 07, 2008

WASHINGTON - "Battlemind" pre-deployment training has helped maintain the mental health of deployed Soldiers, stigma has decreased for those who seek treatment, but troops still need more "dwell time" at home, according to findings of an Army study released this week.

A team of Army behavioral healthcare providers shared findings of the Army's fifth Mental Health Advisory Team, known as MHAT-5, with news media Thursday at the Pentagon. Results of the study "reflect a snapshot of the morale and mental health of deployed Soldiers last fall in Iraq and Afghanistan," according to Maj. Gen. Gale S. Pollock, deputy surgeon general for Force Management.

"The MHAT-5 focused on the behavioral health of Soldiers, the behavioral healthcare system in Iraq and Afghanistan, and the future of behavioral healthcare for Soldiers engaged in combat," Pollock said. The advisory team surveyed a total of 2,994 Soldiers, 2,295 in Iraq and 699 in Afghanistan, as well as 350 behavioral health, primary care and unit ministry team members in Iraq and 87 in Afghanistan.

Leaders in both theaters of operation and at home began implementing MHAT recommendations in February, once the assessment was complete, Pollock said.

The team leader for the MHAT-5 and chief of the Department of Military Psychiatry at the Walther Reed Army Institute of Research, Lt. Col. Paul Bliese, articulated the unique nature of the 2007 study. "This was the first time we had a large amount of data that allowed us to look month by month at the reports of mental health problems as a function of the months deployed," he said. It was also the first time Afghanistan had been included in an MHAT study, although a similar, independent study of the behavioral health of Soldiers deployed as part of Operation Enduring Freedom was conducted in 2005. The findings weren't released at that time, but the results are included in the MHAT-5 report.


Rest of article at: http://www.military.com/features/0,15240,163561,00.html