What's in a memory? PTSD and working with survivors of psychological trauma.

Background: Treating the consequences of psychological trauma and PTSD is of major concern to psychiatry although outcomes are often rather poor, often giving to the fact that the diagnose of PTSD is misused and no consideration of the trauma settings and its consequences on the brain.

Aims: This paper looks at the impact of false or induced memories in the trauma narrative and their potential impact on therapy with examples from the everyday world. The consequences of this in civilian therapy sessions is discussed compared to the classical debriefing for PTSD in the armed forces.

Psychiatric colonialism, PTSD and the Western psychiatric diagnostic tradition . . . is one man's food another man's poison?

Sadly, much of the world is no stranger to Psychological Trauma, particularly in poorer areas with poor health infrastructure. Western Aid Organisations frequently deploy to such areas bringing with them a western psychiatric tradition of nosology and therapy which may not be appropriate in other cultures. We argue that imposing a western system of diagnosis and treatment may not only undermine local culture but may also be bad for the patient.

Ukraine: Meeting the mental health needs of service veterans.

The current conflict in Ukraine is a tragedy of epic proportions that without doubt is causing serious psychological damage with inevitable long term consequences affecting combatants, civilians, not to mention displaced refugees. This paper focuses on the mental health needs of service veterans returning home to a country, devastated by the current conflict.