Abstract:

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is characterized by the typical psychiatric symptoms that emerge following a distressing event that is outside the range of usual human experience. These events include any serious threat to a person's life or physical integrity. Similar events are experienced by the members of the Turkish Armed Forces who work in the southeastern region of Turkey and are under the threat of continual terrorist attacks, which often prove to be fatal and cause great distress and anxiety. This study investigates the possibility of a rise in the number of PTSD cases in the military staff due to the increasing life-threatening events that occur in the southeastern region of Turkey. Referrals made in 1992 from the southeast military sample to the psychiatry Department of Gulhane Military Academy, the main military hospital in Turkey, are investigated. The study compares and contrasts the role of the trauma and premorbid vulnerability factors, investigates the severity of symptoms, the degree of disability caused by the disorder, the range of concurrent psychiatric disorders along with PTSD, the different onset patterns of morbidity, and the demographical characteristics of the cases.

Affiliations: 1: Ankara University, Turkey 2: Gulhane Military Medical Academy, Turkey

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