Many veterans suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder, with some 800,000 currently estimated to be living with PTSD. Challenging and sometimes debilitating symptoms of mental illness—like depression, frustration, sleeplessness, nightmares, flashbacks, and feelings of isolation—prevent many veterans from working and leading healthful lives. Those who have served are not the only ones affected by their trauma; family members suffer alongside them. Health care providers serving vets also struggle to cope with their patients’ and their own stress and trauma.
Our work with military veterans
Since 2007, The Center for Mind-Body Medicine has trained over 800 clinicians and peer counselors who work with veterans and active duty military. Published in The New York Times article, “For Veterans, a Surge of New Treatments for Trauma” highlights CMBM’s work: “The Center for Mind-Body Medicine’s program…is the most comprehensive of all of them…and it is the one with the strongest evidence that it works to cure PTSD.”
In 2019, expanding on 10 years of partnership-building with Veterans Administration centers around the country, CMBM signed a contract with the Veterans Affairs (VA) Sunshine Healthcare Network (VISN 8).
VISN 8 provides healthcare services to veterans in Florida, South Georgia, Puerto Rico, and the U.S. Virgin Islands. Designed and implemented in partnership with the VA’s national Office of Patient-Centered Care and Cultural Transformation (OPCC-CT), the VISN 8 program is integrating CMBM’s curriculum with the VA’s existing Whole Health Coaching curriculum. VISN 8 staff have integrated our model into their clinical work with the entire system, and VISN 8 leadership have recommended that CMBM’s training programs should lay the foundation for the VA’s national response program.
