Post-traumatic stress disorder and the mental health of military personnel and veterans : Trouble de stress post-traumatique et santé mentale du personnel militaire et des vétérans

One hundred and fifty-seven soldiers and four civilians died, and by the end of 2010, a total of 1,859 soldiers had been wounded.1 Canada’s participation in the conflict in Afghanistan was at the centre of political debate over the redefinition of Canada’s role in the world after the events of 11 September 2001. [...] With the success of military treatment programs during the first years of the Vietnam War, “gross stress reaction” was not detected, and it was dropped from the second edition of the DSM (DSM-II) which appeared in 1968. [...] To reflect the connection between exposure to a traumatic event and various forms of mental disorders, the Canadian government uses the term “operational stress injury.” It is a broader term than “post-traumatic stress disorder” and is used by the Department of National Defence, Veterans Affairs Canada, and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police to refer to “any persistent form of psychological difficu [...] In fact, because the military environment and services provided by the CF differ from the civilian life of veterans and the services provided by VAC, the findings of studies for one of these groups do not lend themselves to extrapolation to the other. [...] A recent study on the causes of death for former members of the CF provides initial estimates of numbers to indicate the extent of the problem.22 The following data are for those who enrolled in the Regular Force after 1972 and were released prior to 31 December 2007: • Men (total of 96,786): 2,620 had died, 696 (26.6%) by suicide.