Soldiers and Families Embraced, S.A.F.E., is a non-profit agency that provides service to military members and their families. They are a resource for the community that helps to ease the readjustment and reintegration of military members returning from war and their families, as well as veterans from previous eras. In December of 2011 the Lazarus project merged with S.A.F.E. The founder started the S.A.F.E. program when she realized that there was a growing need for students who were connected to the military because of the stress of the war in Afghanistan and Iraq. As soldiers began to return home rates of PTSD, alcohol and drug abuse, child abuse, domestic violence, traumatic brain injuries, and suicide began to rise. There became a sudden growing need for mental health workers. Because 20 percent of those deployed to the war came from Fort Campbell their mental health staff became very busy. This lead to clients not being seen or not getting the treatment they needed. S.A.F.E. helped and continues to help many veterans today.
S.A.F.E. provides a very unique service to military members that they cannot receive elsewhere. S.A.F.E. is completely confidential
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with the exception to HIPPA laws stating otherwise. Military members often times see things and have done things that have given them a different outlook on life and ways of looking at themselves and others after they return from combat. They often times have to find a “new normal” and this doesn’t have to associate to negative feelings or outcomes. Counseling at S.A.F.E. allows people to cope and come to grips with the trauma they’ve experienced. Clients are able to discuss issues without fear of judgment because the agency does not report to their chain of command and they “get it”. S.A.F.E’s mission is to ease the readjustment and reintegration of military members and their families. They also attempt to help develop future mental healthcare professionals by offering internships and other professional development opportunities. Since the beginning of August S.A.F.E. has began to have an increase in clients. However, safe only has a limited amount of space in their current building. On certain days counselors and clients are waiting for another session to finish so they can go into that room. There are even some days that counselors and clients have to use the conference room for a session because the agency ran out of available counseling rooms. However, they are already planning to move into a bigger building the beginning of next year. S.A.F.E. also has a limited amount of paid staff and because of this the staff are very busy. This has and may continue to affect the training that interns receive because of the time management. Interns at S.A.F.E.
are responsible for doing the intake with the clients. However, before interns can lead intakes by themselves they have to go through training. The interns have to learn about the paper work, learn how to explain the paperwork, and learn how to score the needed paperwork. After that is learned they then have to watch as a supervisor leads intakes. They take notes on what she says and how she engages with the clients. Then using their supervisors notes they will learn how to put the client information into the database and how to write the notes. Interns will then start to take their own notes on the clients and once they finish the supervisor looks over them. Finally the interns lead some intakes with a supervisor watching. After the supervisor feels they are ready they are on their
own. S.A.F.E. does not have any written policies or manuals for interns or staff to refer to. When there is a question interns have to wait to speak with the supervisor to get it answered. This then slows down the learning process. There have also been counselors that have asked about policies for vacation and both the directors said they don’t have one but they will discuss figuring one out.
...t and seeing signs of improvement in their mental health (Edge, 2010). Ultimately, the current structure of the United States’ society under capitalism does not allow for an adequate solution to the social problem of the rise of PTSD among military members. Society is structured around individual and corporate interests, which does not leave room for the unique treatments required for PTSD. Unless capitalism is dismantled and a socialist society is created, which would dramatically change the current military structure and potentially reinstate the draft, soldiers will be forced to seek treatment from the neoconservative and liberal systems that offer inadequate treatment, if at all. As social workers, we must operate from the radical humanist perspective of structural social work and seek to help our military members from within the current system, for now.
Supervisors are acting as trainers when implementing the formal orientation and OJT process. It is important that they thoroughly learn the content of the orientation process, as well as learn how to implement the process with new trainees. By implementing the Train-the-Trainer Model, Burgess is ensuring that each direct supervisor, receive the same training and have common KSA regarding the support and preparation of new employees. She increases the likelihood or consistency for the job site training offered each need employee. Additionally, with Train-the-Trainer model, direct supervisors can understand their roles in the process and it further increases their accountability regarding the success of new hires at their
Six enlisted men who were professionally qualified psychiatric social workers were assigned to the newly formed Mental Hygiene Consultation Service at Ft. Monmouth, New Jersey. This event was the first time that military personnel who were professionally trained social workers were assigned and utilized as psychiatric social workers in a military unit. (Daley, 2009, p. 4)
The historical perspective of the First Special Service dates back to March 1942. The United States forces were allied to the British forces. A British Combined Forces Sci...
“Wounded Platoon” is a documentary that delves into the severe effects of tours and post-traumatic stress on young individuals in the U.S. Army. This documentary mainly focuses on the psychological aspect of PTSD and the effects of war on the soldiers. However, looking at it from a sociological approach, it’s clear to see the role of group dynamics, teams and leadership in the behaviors of soldiers prior to their discharge from the war front.
- - -, dir. “Air Force Special Operations Command.” The Official Web Site of the United Stated Air Force. U.S. Air Force, 20 Sept. 2011. Web.
“In September 2005”, Van Dahlen created a nonprofit organization called Give an Hour, where she and other highly skilled psychologists work together for the common goal of providing free mental health care to military personnel and their loved ones (“About Us”). Slowly but surely, Van Dahlen has created this organization that has produced “volunteers capable of responding to both acute and chronic conditions” and she has had the honor and privilege to forever change the lives of our country’s protectors for the better (“Mission Statement”). Growing up, a young Barbara Van Dahlen always had an immense respect for our military, as the daughter of an injured World War II veteran. Occasionally, she would hear her father reminiscing about his days in the service and all of the battles and training that he participated in. However, she recalls that he would often excise the da...
In 2007 two Washington Post reporters spent four months visiting Walter Reed hospital’s outpatient world known as building 18. The conditions were bad, floors rotted through, stained carpet, mouse droppings, cheap mattresses and the smell of cheap takeout in the air. This is how our veterans lived. They received premier medical treatment, saving their lives. So they could get lost in the paperwork. The outpatient process was lacking to say the least. These soldiers came from a war zone to a chaotic scene where soldiers with traumatic brain injuries and PTSD were supposed to be in charge of soldiers at risk of suicide. The staff was unqualified or disconnected. They had to fill out paperwork for multiple commands and keep up with appointments, while they couldn’t even remember their way around the hospital. They had pay issues and trouble feeding their families. Vera Heron spent 15 frustrating months living on post to help care for her son. "It just absolutely took forever to get anything done," Heron said. "They do the paperwork, they lose the paperwork. Then they have to redo the paperwork. You are talking about guys and girls whose lives are disrupted for the rest of their lives, and they don't put any priority on it (Priest & Hull, 2007)."
A survey of OEF/OIF Veterans identified major rates of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), depression, alcohol-related problems, social and family problems, and suicidal behavior. However the most alarming statistic is not about deployment rates or rates of diagnoses, the most alarming fact is that fewer than 10% of those diagnosed with PTSD or depression have received the recommended the mental health treatment upon re-integration into society. The dropout rate at the Veterans Association (VA) PTSD clinics is distressingly high as well when looking into VA records it was found that 68% of OEF/OIF Veterans dropped out of their prescribed counseling and programs prior to completion (Garcia et al., 2014). Because most of these men were deployed mul...
...They have studied members of 4 US combat infantry units 3 Army units and a Marine Corps unit using an anonymous survey that was administered to the subjects either before their deployment to Iraq or 3 to 4 months after their return from combat duty in Iraq or Afghanistan. The outcomes included major depression, generalized anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder PTSD, which were evaluated on the basis of standardized self-administered screening instruments. But studies showed that they people that where deployed to iraq was dealing with the mental weaknesses much more than troops deployed anywhere else.
Participation in warfare can create dramatic conditions and experiences for the mental health and well-being of military personnel. During the 20th century, US military psychiatrists attempted to deal with the mental problematic consequences of warfare while also helping to achieve to the military goal of preserving the number of people available for work, and decreasing the weakening impact of psychiatric syndromes by implementing screening programs to detect factors that would predispose individuals to mental disorders, providing early intervention strategies for difficult war-related syndromes, and treating long-term psychiatric disability after deployment.
Soldiers returning home had terrible PTSD, they were always angry and on edge. As Arthur McLella recalls one time where he was driving and someone cut him off and he lost it, he was chasing after him and wanted to confront him. His family was asking him to stop then he realized there was nothing he can do, he though “what am I going to do kill him?” Another veteran took on drinking, lost everything he had become homeless, lost his family, he says he was never himself and that was the cause of all this. There was one las lady who was asked if what they did to their son who would wake up in the middle off the night crying, was to hug and support him was the correct thing to do. It was, and after time he would live a normal life, almost like he recovered, similar to Achilles when he was with
HBO Documentary represents short clips from WWII and the Vietnam War, including, short interviews of soldiers who express their traumatic experiences when they first witness death. A woman, a mother, argued the fact her son was trained to be a killer and not be a human being. This had led the son to commit suicide in his truck, placing his dog tag on his forehead, and shot himself while being sober. He left his final letter to his mother to read, letting her know that he has this recurring thought of dying and deserving this punishment. Deserving the punishment to commit suicide to pay back the lives he took from the war. However, there is a way to help Veterans who are nowhere close to getting help. They can receive help from the comfort of their own home. “ ‘The benefits of providing psychiatric services via telemedicine are that it makes psychiatrists more available in different locations,’ says R. Andrew Harper, M.D., associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry... ‘... telemedicine is being used to reach out to these soldiers who are geographically displaced,’says Col. Ronald C. Poropatich, M.D., deputy director of the U.S. Army's” (Paragraph 4 and 10 in line 18 through 40 from Teleservices, by E-Health). This method can lessen the stress and budget for soldiers. Doctors and specialist are doing their best to research and
Provide training sessions and advice to other staff, so all staff are to a high level of dispensing.