Continuing controversy over the psychological risks of Vietnam for U.S. veterans

Abstract

In 1988, the National Vietnam Veterans Readjustment Study (NVVRS) reported 30.9% lifetime and 15.2% current rates of posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and a strong dose/response relationship with retrospective reports of combat exposure. Skeptics argued that recall bias and other flaws inflated the results. Using a new record-based exposure measure and diagnoses in an NVVRS subsample, the authors addressed this controversy in a recent issue of Science (B. P. Dohrenwend et al., 2006). They found little evidence of falsification, an even stronger dose/response relationship and, when fully adjusted for impairment and evidence of exposure, 18.7% onset and 9.1% current rates of war-related PTSD. The fact that these rates are lower than the original NVVRS rates has stimulated continuing controversy that has tended to obscure the more important implications of the study's results.

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