Wounded Warrior Project recently released the results of its 2015 Alumni Survey, which found more than 75% of wounded veterans have post-traumatic stress disorder.
According to a Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) press release, the collection of data is the largest ever collected on the current generation of injured veterans. More than 23,000 injured service members completed the survey.
“Our annual survey shows that this generation of injured veterans continue[s] to struggle with the invisible wounds of war, including [post-traumatic stress disorder] PTSD and [traumatic brain injury] TBI, and the challenges are not getting better with time,” Steve Nardizzi, WWP chief executive officer, said in the release. “The information in this survey solidifies the need for our lifetime commitment of support to the warriors, family members and caregivers we serve. For as long as their challenges continue, WWP will be here.”
WWP announced the following statistics from the 2015 survey:
- More than one-third of respondents (35%) said they had difficulty getting mental health care, had put off getting mental health care or did not get the care they needed.
- In the 2 weeks prior to completing the survey, 43.3% of respondents had trouble falling asleep or slept too much nearly every day.
- Nearly two-thirds of respondents (66.4%) had nightmares about their military experiences and 75.5% thought about their experiences when they did not want to.
- Overall, 76.1% of respondents were constantly on guard, watchful or easily startled because of their military experience.
- Slightly more than half of respondents (53.6%) visited a professional to get help with issues, such as stress, emotional, alcohol, drug or family problems.
- Overall, 16.6% of surveyed veterans were unemployed.
The entire survey and executive summary are available at www.woundedwarriorproject.org/survey.
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