AMNA NAWAZ: Long after they come home, many troops continue to face battles with post-traumatic
stress disorder.
Some of them find that traditional therapy programs are not enough, and instead seek
different programs and medicine than before.
Special correspondent Mike Cerre reports on the new ways former soldiers are now fighting
to overcome their trauma.
MIKE CERRE: After three tours of duty in Iraq and one in Afghanistan, veterans of Fox Company,
2nd Battalion, 5th Marines, known as FOX 2/5, thought their wars were over.
But their fight has followed them home.
More members of their unit have since died from suicide than from combat, as they continue
to battle PTSD, post-traumatic stress disorders, from their service.
Former Corporal William Yellowhair was the unit's third and most recent suicide.
CPL.
WILLIAM YELLOWHAIR, U.S. Marine Corps: I like to know what we're going into, what we're
getting into, what kind of operations we're going to be doing.
MIKE CERRE: Despite more than a decade of in- and out-patient treatment at the VA hospital
in Prescott, Arizona, William Yellowhair's body was found in his garage next to his service
duffel bag and pictures of his Iraq service.
As an embedded reporter with FOX 2/5 on two of their tours of duty in Iraq, and following
up with them over the years, many of them have shared their difficulties with varying
degrees of PTSD and the different treatments they have tried, with mixed results.
KAINE MARZOLA, Former U.S. Marine: I felt extremely isolated because I couldn't relate
to anybody.
MIKE CERRE: Kaine Marzola, highlighted here fighting from a rooftop in Ramadi, Iraq, was
first diagnosed with PTSD while still in the Marines.
After his discharge, he was treated at his local VA hospital near Las Vegas.
KAINE MARZOLA: When they started to giving me all the medications, I lost all of that.
I lost what made me special, what made me different, what made me stand out amongst
my peers.
I just was a zombie.
I didn't care.
Didn't have a fight, no more fight left in me.
MIKE CERRE: Frustrated by the traditional PTSD drug and therapy protocols, he created
one of his own based on an intense physical training to regain what he calls his fighting
spirit.
CPL.
MICHAEL ELLIOT (RET.), U.S. Marine Corps: Seeing things out here, being part of a war,
part of history, it has impacted us all in different aspects, I think.
Definitely, it's changed my life forever.
I won't go back to the States the same.
MIKE CERRE: After coming home, former corporal Michael Elliot was initially reluctant to
get treated for his PTSD.
CPL.
MICHAEL ELLIOT: I hit rock bottom.
I got a DUI for drinking.
Quit my job that I had here, a little short-term job.
I was just like, this is not me.
Something is wrong.
I need help.
MIKE CERRE: He confessed to driving to the VA Hospital in Helena, Montana, for nearly
a year, and sitting in the parking lot, before mustering the courage to share his problems
with professionals.
CPL.
MICHAEL ELLIOT: It's a safe place.
It's a place where people are actually here to help you.
And a lot of time, out in the community, your family and things like that, you feel like
you don't want to complain with your story or your issues to people.
MIKE CERRE: According to the VA, nearly 10 percent to 20 percent of recent combat veterans,
and 15 percent of Vietnam era veterans, are experiencing some degree of PTSD.
Together, they account for nearly 20 percent of the VA's patients.
Most experts agree that psychotherapy programs is the most effective long-term treatment.
The problem, it's not easy or readily accessible to veterans when they need it in their daily
lives.
DR.
THOMAS NEYLAN, San Francisco VA Hospital: Well, some of it has to do with the nature
of PTSD, and that is that people with PTSD try to avoid memories and things that remind
them of their experiences.
MIKE CERRE: Dr. Thomas Neylan, head of San Francisco VA Hospital's PTSD clinic, understands
FOX 2/5 and other veterans' complaints with existing PTSD treatments.
Namely, cognitive therapy can take months of emotional sessions discussing their trauma,
which can be too difficult and time-consuming to complete.
The prescribed antidepressant medications mostly treat PTSD symptoms, rather than the
underlying problems.
DR.
THOMAS NEYLAN: These medications have side effects.
Sexual side effects is really common, sedation, insomnia, and there's a host of them.
And yes, the medicines are better than they used to be, but no one's happy with the current
status.
MIKE CERRE: What are some of things you're looking at to maybe make the cognitive therapy
easier or more accessible?
DR.
THOMAS NEYLAN: There's been a lot of effort to sort of optimize cognitive therapies, to
speed them up, to telescope them into a shorter period of time.
MIKE CERRE: The VA is also using teleconferencing to make the therapy more accessible and convenient,
and developing mobile apps to help vets deal with their PTSD crises wherever they might
emerge.
WOMAN: Welcome the body.
Shift back to that feeling of calm tranquility.
DR.
KAREN SEAL, San Francisco VA Hospital: We can recommend some complementary integrative
therapies that are known to reduce stress and have some preliminary evidence for PTSD,
such as yoga or mindfulness meditation or acupuncture.
MIKE CERRE: Dr. Karen Seal, the director of the San Francisco VA's integrated care clinic,
believes many of these complimentary treatments the VA is now offering can reduce the dependence
on prescribed drugs.
Many veterans are relying on recreational drugs for their symptoms, which the VA can't
prescribe, like marijuana, and MDMA, commonly known as ecstasy, which is further along in
the clinical trials and more promising for treating the underlying causes of PTSD, according
to the Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies, conducting the research.
MAN: This is the time for the supplemental dose, if you want to take it.
MAN: Sure, why not?
REBECCA MATTHEWS, Multidisciplinary Association of Psychedelic Studies: Cannabis only works
in symptom reduction, is the hypothesis.
And with MDMA, we believe, is that it can actually cure PTSD, with the way it works
in the brain and the way that the neuroplasticity and the relearning and reconsolidation of
the memories.
MIKE CERRE: MDMA taken alone is not believed to be a silver bullet cure.
Therapy is still required and experts warn against taking MDMA and other psychedelics
for PTSD without professional assistance.
SAL "DOC" CHAVEZ, Former U.S. Navy Soldier: About a week ago, I had a sniper came real
close.
You never know out here.
An IED, we used to -- I guess the first couple months, we saw them every day.
MIKE CERRE: Sal Chavez, a former Navy corpsman with FOX 2/5, has tried several therapy programs,
both at the VA and in private practice.
He believes his 15-year struggle with PTSD is responsible for his excessive drinking,
fighting, divorce, and frequent thoughts of suicide.
DR.
SKIP RIZZO, Clinical Psychologist: We're seeing people that end up killing themselves because
they never got the treatment, or the treatment was ineffective in addressing their needs.
MIKE CERRE: Dr. Skip Rizzo, a research psychologist at USC's Institute for Creative Technologies,
has been developing virtual reality programs for engaging this generation of PTSD veterans
in exposure therapy.
DR.
SKIP RIZZO: The goal isn't that just by going back to the scene of the crime, you're magically
going to get fixed.
The goal is, is to activate those emotions and reprocess them, and to do it repeatedly
and in that safe context.
MIKE CERRE: With the help of Dr. Todd Adamson, a former VA therapist, Sal Chavez agreed to
reexperience a particularly traumatic event we both were involved in during a roadside
ambush on FOX 2/5's final approach to Baghdad, when they suffered their first fatalities,
on April 4, 2003.
SAL "DOC" CHAVEZ: Everything was on fire.
It was loud.
Rounds were going off, Matech being shot off.
You could feel the percussions of all the explosions.
MAN: How do you feel in your body right now that you're watching this?
SAL "DOC" CHAVEZ: A little tense.
I know that this is a virtual world, but I'm like -- my habits are doing what I'm supposed
to be doing.
MAN: Yes.
MIKE CERRE: V.R. can never be an exact representation, but it's stimulating enough for the vet and
the therapist to work together more efficiently and to make the traumatic experiences easier
to deal with.
SAL "DOC" CHAVEZ: So I had to find it within me to start making the hard choices of facing
myself, finding help, doing whatever I had to do to get healthy again.
MIKE CERRE: Kaine Marzola is working with other vets on overcoming their PTSD problems.
And Michael Elliot is getting his master's degree in social work to do the same, as the
Marines of FOX 2/5 continue their battles with PTSD.
For the "PBS NewsHour," I'm Mike Cerre reporting from San Francisco.