True Cost of War in Iraq: Provider Fatigue

Posted on | March 14, 2007 | Comments Off on True Cost of War in Iraq: Provider Fatigue

As I mentioned earlier this week, prior Health Politics pieces have catalogued the true cost of the war in Iraq. March 19’s Newsweek, mentioned in The Wall Street Journal this week, identifies yet another cost with its coverage of a military study of the mental health of caregivers in Iraq.

High or very high degrees of burnout were found in:

45% of doctors and nurses
33% of psychiatrists and counselors
27% of chaplains

Add this, then, to the list of concerns for today’s VA system, which is already stressed to the max. Our military caregivers are struggling.

Matt Friedman of the VA’s National Center for PTSD says, “If the therapist finds they cannot listen to another awful war story or that they can’t shut down once they’re at home with their kids, that should be a warning sign.”

How does it feel to be caught in the middle? Listen to the words of Chad Peterson of the San Francisco VA Medical Center: “I’ll hear about the things they’ve seen or done, the close calls, and my pulse quickens. I’ll get agitated or feel hopeless, because I can’t take this person’s pain away.”

The take-away here: In damaging the people, you will also predictably damage the people caring for the people.