I was happy to see that our cousins across the ocean are so open to working with traumatic stress in a variety of ways. I had the pleasure of meeting with David Marteau, the head of substance abuse treatment for offenders in London, England. He felt that the complementary therapies "showed real promise" for helping with traumatized people.
Here at home the military is increasingly turning to alternative therapies for PTSD in their personnel. The great thing about the American military is that they are intensely pragmatic and great at following protocol. Treatments that have been researched by the Pentagon and/or used to date include: acupuncture, aromatherapy (yes, really), yoga, reiki massage, relaxation techniques, mindfulness. The Ft. Bliss Restoration and Resilience Center has an integrative model that has treated dozens of officers with multidimensional holistic treatments. They went from a 10 percent redeployment rate of officers with PTSD to a redeployment rate of over 60 percent for those who completed the program! Complementary therapies work!
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