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PTSD Resolution: Media Key Facts

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PTSD Resolution is a charity (No. 1133188) that offers free treatment, with an 83% success rate, to UK armed forces’ veterans, TA, reservists and dependants, to relieve mental health problems resulting from military service, to ease reintegration into a normal work & family life.

  • The PTSD Resolution national outreach programme has over 200 therapists. It is free, private, confidential, local, one-to-one with no waiting lists and no referral needed, thus reducing any sense of stigma. Therapy is brief and effective – generally within three to five one-hour sessions.
  • PTSD Resolution offers employers Trauma Awareness Training to support the successful integration of veterans and TA in the workplace. The half-day modular courses enable line managers and HR staff to recognise potential symptoms of trauma and identify a clear route to resolving any workplace difficulties
  • Resolution therapists are trained in Human Givens Therapy (HGT)(1), which includes a form of Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (TFCBT), consistent with the guidelines of the National Institute for Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE).
  • Patients are not required to talk about the traumatic events. The programme policy is that re-exposure is better done in the client’s visual imagination and while in a relaxed state, protecting confidentiality and reducing distress. This relatively new development of TFCBT, similar to Imagery Re-scripting and Reprocessing Therapy (IRRT). (2)
  • The Resolution network was launched in February 2010, following a three-year pilot programme, which included a project with the Falklands Veterans Foundation (www.fvf.org.uk ) that helped ex-services personnel recover from symptoms which had lasted 25 years in some cases.
  • The programme has an 83% success rate (3) across the 266 UK veterans treated to date. This is similar to the recovery rate in the recent study of 599 stress-related cases from the general population who were treated using HGT: over 70% reached a significant and sustained improvement after an average of 3.6 treatment sessions (4).
  • Treatment is complementary to the work of other armed forces charities, because it can resolve the immediate mental health issues that may be barriers to successful help under reintegration and resettlement programmes.
  • Therapists work in prisons, and there is an active programme of engagement with the prison service nationally. The patron of the charity is Lord Ramsbotham, former Inspector of Prisons. There are an estimated 8,500 veterans in prison with 3,000 on parole (5). NAPO estimates that half this number suffer from PTSD and related disorders. 
  • Resolution provides a service that is absent from the national provision for veterans’ mental health; of those veterans that access treatment through other channels, research suggests that the majority approach their GP and just receive medication, without dealing with the trauma. One study of vulnerable veterans found that only 4% of those seeking treatment had been offered evidence-based therapeutic help (6).

Note Editor: References:-

(1) What is Human Givens Therapy: See www.hgi.org.uk

(2) Holmes, E. A., et al., 2007. Imagery rescripting in cognitive behaviour therapy. Journal of Behavior Therapy and Experimental Psychiatry

(3) Bishop, P., O’Callaghan, B., 2010. Effectiveness of HG Therapy for war veterans [online]. Available at: http://abstracts.bps.org.uk/index.cfm?&ResultsType=Abstracts&ResultSet_ID=5713&FormDisplayMode=view&frmShowSelected=true&localAction=details

(4) Andrews, W.P. et al., 2011. Piloting a practice research network: A 12-month

evaluation of the Human Givens approach in primary care at a general medical practice. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice

(5) Ex-Armed Forces Personnel and the Criminal Justice System: NAPO Report, August 2008

(6) Iverson, A., van Staden, L., Hughes, J., Browne, T., Hull, I., Hall, J., et al. (2009) The prevalence of common mental disorders and PTSD in the UK military: using data from a clinical interview-based study. BMC Psychiatry. 9:68

www.ptsdresolution.org or Tel 0845 021 7873 or e-mail contact@ptsdresolution.org.  - Facebook: http://is.gd/4RPUV

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ptsd military ptsd UK veterans Human Givens Therapy PTSD Resolution national trauma awareness training UK armed forces Armed Forces Personnel TA Falklands Veterans Foundation Cognitive Behavioural Therapy HGT HG Therapy

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