PTSD services for veterans to be offered in region

Veterans, active military and RCMP personnel who have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) relating to their jobwill soon be able to have access to mental health services closer to home.

A partnership between The Centre for Mental Health Research (CMHR) at the University of Waterloo and Parkwood Institute's Operational Stress Injury Clinic (OSIC) hopes to play an important part by providing psychological services and assessments for patients.

The demand for mental health services has increased significantly over the past years as the number of individuals with PTSD has tripled creating a substantial need to aid in their recovery.

"We wanted to be able to provide services in more locations," said Dr. Ian Nicholson, Director of CMHR. "It's not an increase of service but an increase in the places where the service would be available to them."

OSIC administers support to patients from a large geographical area and Heather Tales, director of veterans care at St. Joseph's, says that they "are always looking for creative ways to extend their services."

"There are only two clinics in Ontario, and we are one of them," said Tales. "We are responsible to serve clients from southwestern Ontario, the Greater Toronto Area, Hamilton Niagara Region and even parts of central Ontario."

On alert

The partnership will not be limited to just mental health services. In the future it also aims to help military personnel who may suffer from depression and drug addiction. But for now, the first step is to provide thorough psychological assessments to determine the needs of the individuals.

Dr. Nicholson says often individuals with PTSD are on alert for potential threat all the time which begins to overwhelm them. They also have difficulty building and holding on to relationships with their family member and loved ones.

"This trauma can begin to seep into the rest of their lives," Nicholson said.

Training

This also opens the opportunity to train psychology postdoc students. Tales mentions how Dr.Shannon Gifford, who's a psychologist in the OSIC clinic in London, worked with Dr. Nicholson and his team which initiated the idea to continue the advancement and training of the psychology postdoc students.

"We have seen wonderful benefits with the training and very positive response from the students who are working with Dr. Gifford," she said.

Dr. Gifford travels to the University of Waterloo to work with students during their training and supervises the assessments done to patients.The students will train and gain experience from the comprehensive assessments conducted to the patients. Students will also be exposed to the military culture to better their knowledge and understanding of the patients that may be under their care in the future.