Purple Heart urged for veterans with PTSD

By Jeff Schogol, Stars and Stripes
Mideast edition, Sunday, May 4, 2008

A military psychologist suggests making troops suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder eligible for the Purple Heart to help remove the stigma of a disorder affecting about 20 percent of combat veterans.

Such a move would be a major change in the Purple Heart awards policy, which does not classify PTSD as a combat wound.

John E. Fortunato is chief of the Recovery and Resilience Center at Fort Bliss, Texas, where he treats soldiers suffering from PTSD.

During a visit to Fort Bliss on Thursday, Defense Secretary Robert Gates praised the center, which uses intensive individual therapy and nontraditional ways such as acupuncture, meditation and yoga to treat PTSD.

At Red River Army Depot on Friday, Gates said it was an “interesting idea” to award the Purple Heart to troops suffering from PTSD, adding the issue is “clearly something that needs to be looked into.”

On Thursday, Fortunato said PTSD is a “physical disorder, at least in part,” because it damages the brain, making it no different from shrapnel wounds.

However, an Army regulation precludes troops suffering from PTSD from being awarded the Purple Heart, he said.

“I would love to see that change, because these guys have paid at least a high — as high a price, some of them — as anybody with a traumatic brain injury, as anybody with shrapnel wound, and what it does is it says this is the wound that isn’t worthy, and I say it is,” Fortunato said.

more:  http://urlet.com/happens.norfolk