Nutritional Supplements and PTSD

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is when an individual experiences a traumatic event. PTSD may have been originally been associated with war, acts of war and other major traumatic events. During WWI PTSD was known as “Shell Shock” and “combat fatigue” after WWII. In 1980 PostTraumatic Stress Disorder was officially recognized and given a diagnosis by the American Psychiatric Association, DSM-III. Since 1980 the diagnosis criteria for PTSD has changed and evolved. The American Psychiatric Association revised the PTSD diagnosis code in DSM-III-R (1987), DSM-IV (1994), DSM-IV TR (2000). The first diagnosis code for PTSD stipulates that a person must have experienced a traumatic event which is outside the range of normal human experience. This experience would include traumatic events like war, torture, or rape. It also included natural disasters like earthquakes and hurricanes and man-made disasters such as factory explosions and auto accidents. In the last revision of the diagnosis code by the American Psychiatric Association, it begins to allow for the variable that PTSD cannot be fully objectified because every person will respond and cope with a traumatic experience differently.