Nillni, Y. I., Gradus, J. L., Gutner, C. A., Luciano, M. T., Shipherd, J. C., & Street, A. E. (2014, July 14). Deployment Stressors and Physical Health Among OEF/OIF Veterans: The Role of PTSD. Health Psychology. Advance online publication. http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/hea0000084
Nillni, Gradus, Gutner, Luciano, Shipherd, and Street are all professors at the Boston University School of Medicine, who created a study based the role of PTSD or Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in Operation Iraqi Freedom veterans. Their position was that exposure to traumatic stress and combat stress were directly associated with an increase in physical health symptoms. The participants of the study included 2,332 OIF Veterans with 1,201 of these veterans being female. The professors used a series of hierarchical linear regression models to examine the effects of deployment and PTSD symptoms on physical health symptoms. In the conclusion of all there research it was discovered that for both men and women, after accounting for PTSD symptoms, combat stress did not give any unique variance in symptoms. Another big conclusion was that harassment while deployed plays a major role in the diagnosis of PTSD in many veterans. The professors used the information gathered throughout their study to support the fact that harassment was as big of a factor in veterans with PTSD and the combat stresses or experience itself. Their conclusion that they drew is as stated, “This study extends the existing literature by demonstrating the unique influence of harassment stress on physical health outcomes. Specifically, the relationship between combat stress and physical health symptoms appears to be explained mainly by an individual’s experience of PTSD symptoms, whereas the relationship between harassment stress and physical health symptoms is not fully explained by
