Post-traumatic Stress Disorder

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Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is a common health problem in individuals who encounter a severe trauma or life threatening event. It can occur from war, natural disaster, rape, and many other life-threatening events. However, how do health care professionals know how to diagnose and treat someone with PTSD? It is difficult to diagnose someone with PTSD, but once diagnosed, nurses are extremely involved in the care of these individuals. Post-traumatic stress disorder is especially common in military veterans who experienced a traumatic event in combat. It is important for nurses and other health care members to recognize and understand how to treat a military member with PTSD. When I graduate I will be a nurse in the military. I expect to be taken care of soldiers coming back from war quite often. It is important for me to be able to assess a military member and be able to recognize the signs and symptoms of PTSD. Not only do I as a nurse need to be able to recognize the symptoms, but I also need to know how to care for someone with the disorder in order to improve their quality of life. Understanding how to care for military members suffering from PTSD is important and not well understood. In April 2010, statistics show that eighteen United States soldiers were committing suicide every day due to the depression related to PTSD (“Understanding Combat PTSD from the Inside, Out”, 2007). It seems as though it is not being recognized that military members coming back from war are suffering from PTSD. As health care providers, it should be mandatory to screen for PTSD in soldiers coming back from war to prevent it from going unrecognized. Then, it is the nurses’ responsibility to know how to care for these suffering military vet... ... middle of paper ... ...ealth care team (Baxter, 2004). An article by Marycarol Rossignal recognizes PTSD in military veterans. The article gives statistics, the three main symptoms of PTSD in depth, screening, treatment, and lifelong management. The statistics, symptoms, screening and treatment were able to be used in the paper. There were no studies identified, but most of the information can easily be incorporated into nursing care (Rossignal & Chandler, 2010). Even though post-traumatic stress disorder is difficult to diagnose, with the right teaching, nurses can successfully assess and help diagnose a patient with PTSD. Significant signs and symptoms should alert a nurse to question whether or not a patient has PTSD. Military veterans are especially at risk for combat related PTSD and with the correct assessment by a nurse, the patient can get the correct treatment to overcome PTSD.

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