Gulf Traumas Come Home to Roost : Military: A new study confirms that some returning soldiers and their families are having a tough time getting their lives back in order. Divorce, substance abuse are on the rise.

Early concerns that soldiers returning from duty in the Persian Gulf--and their families--would experience significant readjustment disorders have been confirmed, according to a new position paper submitted to the Office of Veterans Affairs by a group of psychologists.

Among the problems reported are a disproportionate increase in divorces, growing alcohol and chemical abuse, “relationship disorders” among family members, and individual manifestations of anxiety that range from insomnia to hyper-vigilance.

The document is to be submitted today to the office of Veterans Affairs Secretary Edward Derwinski, as well as to key members of Congress and certain officials at the Department of Defense. The privately funded paper pulls together the findings of about 20 mental health professionals who treated Persian Gulf personnel and their families.

“This is essentially groundbreaking stuff,” said Jon Perez, a Los Angeles psychologist who contributed to the paper. After the Vietnam War, he said, “it never occurred to anyone” to talk to returning soldiers about possible mental problems.

At the University of Cincinnati, Ellin L. Bloch, an associate professor of clinical family medicine who also contributed to the report, called the effort an attempt to “employ and go beyond the lessons of Vietnam,” and to build a network among mental health professionals who work with military personnel and their families.

“We can’t view the veterans’ needs as separate from the families’ needs,” Bloch said. “The two go hand in hand.”

While carrying no official mandate or imprimatur, the position paper recommends “preventive mental health measures and (seeks to) target areas where early intervention may be necessary.” The recommendations include federally sponsored studies of veterans and their families “to assess psychosocial and financial needs (associated) with rapid deployment” and to examine “emotional and behavioral reactions of the combat phase of the Gulf crisis.”

Linda Stalvey, a spokeswoman for the Office of Veterans Affairs in Washington, said although her office has yet to see the report “the lessons of Vietnam” had been “very obvious” in her agency’s efforts to deal with possible post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) among Persian Gulf veterans and their families.

Stalvey said congressional legislation approved in April will expand veterans centers to handle cases of PTSD among returnees not only from the Persian Gulf, but also from Lebanon, Panama, Grenada and other areas of conflict since the Vietnam War.

“The knowledge bank is there, where it was not 20 years ago,” Stalvey said.

Bloch and Perez, a specialist in trauma recovery, said there was a surprising degree of unanimity among the psychologists who had worked with veterans and their families.

“We usually work so independently of each other,” Bloch said. “This is the first time that I know of that there has been some attempt to get together a network like this, and to sound an alarm to the government and the VA.”

Bloch said the psychologists--who came together through a series of mutual contacts--hoped to convey the message that “problems like this are no longer a possibility, they are a reality.” They received no government funding, but hope their conclusions will generate federal allocation of funds for further research and treatment.

“We’re concerned with the whole context” of deployment to and return from the war in Persian Gulf, Bloch said. “We’re not just dealing with the phase of re-entry--of ‘welcome home’ and reintegration.”

Bloch said the new document predicts that “for every one individual suffering from unusual stress” after the Middle East conflict, six others will also be affected. But she said the potential “ripple effect” from stresses for Persian Gulf soldiers and their families is so large that “I think we could use a multiple of 10 in this war.”

The report contends that among other problems affecting some returning soldiers and their families, “divorce rates in several areas of the country where military bases are located have quadrupled since military units have redeployed to home stations.”

Perez said the apparent surge in divorces among returnees from the Persian Gulf “was not totally unexpected, but it was tragic that it was indeed happening.” He said he had seen data from one military installation--Ft. Hood, near Austin, Tex.--that showed “a 375% rise in filing for divorces over what they consider normal” for the comparable period prior to the war.

The position paper also states that “emotional and behavioral responses observed among returning veterans include restlessness, increase in substance abuse, withdrawal and social isolation.” Families are also experiencing stresses resulting from financial pressures, from the restructuring of family power and from fears brought on by the threat of chemical or nuclear attack during the war itself.

In short, Bloch said, “these are the kind of psychological traumas that people expected might happen. Now, after 10 months of observation, we can say that these things are happening.”

With thousands of Persian Gulf military personnel and their families observed and treated in the last 10 months, “the real significance,” Perez said, “is one, we’ve got problems. And two, instead of letting them fester like we did in Vietnam, let’s do something about it now.”