Word: traumas
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...shock, however, is just how understaffed the U.S. Army is with regard to mental-health specialists. Currently, only 408 psychiatrists are serving over 550,000 soldiers. Not only is the Army understaffed, but little attention is paid to the psychiatrists themselves, who can be mentally affected by the trauma described by their patients. While we are hesitant to guess at Hassan’s motives, the case has exposed this real lack of mental-health resources in the military...
...Determining whether Hasan's actions were inspired by religious fervor (he reportedly said "Allahu akbar" before opening fire), his exposure to the mental trauma of the soldiers he counseled or other unknown factors may be impossible. Hasan is in intensive care at a San Antonio hospital, breathing without a respirator. But given his mental state, even he may not know what caused him to kill...
...medical parlance it is known as "secondary trauma," and it can afflict the families of soldiers who suffer from PTSD along with the health workers who are trying to help those soldiers. Dr. Antoinette Zeiss, deputy chief of Mental Health Services for Veterans Affairs, while not wishing to talk about the specific case of the Fort Hood slayings, told TIME that "anyone who works with PTSD clients and hears their stories will be profoundly affected...
...Even for the most hardened Army psychiatrist, counseling PTSD sufferers with terrible wartime stories can be a grueling assignment. Fort Hood has the highest suicide rate of any Army base in the country, largely because so many service men and women stationed there have undergone severe trauma while being deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan. At Fort Hood, in other words, there was no shortage of horrific tales that could have set loose the demons in Hasan's mind...
...will take years to ease the trauma Fort Hood suffered Thursday. The Army will have to deploy more psychiatrists to deal with the surge of PTSD cases sure to come. The post recently has taken steps to ease stress on the home front, including creating "Phantom Family Time." It occurs every Thursday at 3 p.m. That was 86 minutes after one of those psychiatrists dispatched to central Texas to help ailing troops instead began shooting and shouting "Allahu akbar" - God is great - at those counting on him for solace...