PTSD

A pilot study involving 41 military veterans and 5 active-duty soldiers diagnosed with clinical levels of PTSD has found that one month of transcendental meditation produced dramatic benefits, with 37 (80%) having their symptoms reduced to below the clinical level, and 40 having a clinically significant decrease of more than 10 points.

A test 90 days later also showed that PTSD symptoms continued to improve, and a further three individuals had dropped to below the clinical level.

A laboratory study has found that sleeping after watching a trauma event reduced emotional distress and memories related to traumatic events. The laboratory study involved 65 women being shown a neutral and a traumatic video. Typically, recurring memories of certain images haunted the test subjects for a few days (these were recorded in detail in a diary). Some participants slept in the lab for a night after the video, while the other group remained awake.

A randomized clinical trial of 268 active-duty personnel seeking treatment for PTSD has found that individual sessions of cognitive processing therapy were twice as effective as group sessions.

Participants were assigned to CPT in either 90-minute group sessions or 60-minute individual sessions twice weekly for six weeks. PTSD severity was reduced significantly more in those receiving individual treatment, however improvements were maintained during the six-month follow-up in both groups. Depression and suicidal ideation also improved equally with both forms of CPT.

A pilot study involving 23 military veterans with PTSD found that those who received mindfulness training showed reduced PTSD symptoms, and brain changes that suggest a greater ability to shift and control attention. Mindfulness training was given to 14 veterans, while the other 9 received ‘control’ group support. Both groups were given brain scans before and after the treatment program.

An interesting new theory for PTSD suggests that the root of the problem lies in context processing problems.

Context processing allows people and animals to recognize that a particular stimulus may require different responses depending on the context in which it is encountered. So, for example, a lion in the zoo evokes a different response than one encountered in your backyard.

Context processing involves the hippocampus, and its connections to the prefrontal cortex and the amygdala. Research has shown that activity in these brain areas is disrupted in those with PTSD.

Following previous research showing that having a smaller hippocampus is associated with increased risk of PTSD, a study involving 40 participants with PTSD and 36 trauma-exposed healthy controls has found that those PTSD patients who responded to the treatment had larger hippocampi compared to those who didn’t benefit from the therapy.

The participants were evaluated at baseline and after 10 weeks, during which time the PTSD group had prolonged exposure therapy.

Can you help protect yourself from the memory of traumatic events? A new study suggests that, by concentrating on concrete details as you live through the event, you can reduce the number of intrusive memories later experienced.

A meta-analysis of studies reporting brain activity in individuals with a diagnosis of PTSD has revealed differences between the brain activity of individuals with PTSD and that of groups of both trauma-exposed (those who had experienced trauma but didn't have a diagnosis of PTSD) and trauma-naïve (those who hadn't experienced trauma) participants.

The critical difference between those who developed PTSD and those who experienced trauma but didn't develop PTSD lay in the basal ganglia. Specifically: