Military personnel who have poor mental or physical health before they go into combat are more likely to experience post-traumatic stress disorder following their battlefield experience, a U.S. military study finds ...

Poor physical or mental health prior to combat exposure may predispose military personnel to an increased risk for new-onset posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after deployment, new research suggests ...

Pre-Existing Insomnia Linked to PTSD and Other Mental Disorders After Military Deployment Science Daily - 28 June 2013 The new study, published in the July 2013 issue of the journal SLEEP, found that pre-existing insomnia symptoms conferred almost as a large of a risk for those mental disorders as combat exposure.

Service members with one or more mental health disorders prior to deployment were two- and-a-half times more likely to screen positive for PTSD post-deployment compared to those with no mental health disorders, after controlling for pre-deployment PTSD, physical injury severity and a host of other risk factors.

For military personnel, having at least one psychiatric disorder before deployment to Iraq or Afghanistan appears to increase the likelihood of developing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) after deployment, the prospective Millennium Cohort Study showed.

A newly published study finds that PTSD symptoms at baseline, but not other mental health symptoms, are significantly associated with an increased risk of developing diabetes among military service members. Increases in the prevalence of PTSD among the military population could have an impact on rates of physical disorders, such as diabetes, in the coming years.

People suffering from PTSD may be at increased risk of developing autoimmune diseases. These findings support a growing body of evidence showing a link between PTSD, stress, and physical health.

Military service members with symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) are more likely to develop diabetes than their counterparts without PTSD symptoms, results of a new study hint. While previous research has suggested that depression increases the risk of diabetes, the new study of more than 44,000 active duty service members suggests another stronger association.

Analysis of U.S. service members who had deployed either once or multiple times revealed that both groups shared very similar PTSD trajectories over time, with the vast majority (83% single deployers, 85% multiple deployers) displaying a low-stable (resilient) symptom pattern that lasted from pre-deployment to several years post-deployment. The other PTSD symptom trajectory patterns included moderate-improving (8%, 8.5%), worsening-chronic (6.7%, 4.5%), high-stable (2.2% single deployers only) and high-improving (2.2% multiple deployers only).

Today's all-volunteer force is arguably one of the most highly trained and highly educated in our nation's history. To maintain that edge, it must have a strong recruiting pipeline, one that seeks out physically fit, smart young men and women who are interested in serving their country and gaining valuable skills for subsequent careers outside the military. Why, then, don't they recruit for mental health and resiliency?