National Defence committee  I'm Dr. Greg Passey. I served for 22 years in the Canadian Forces until September 2000, first as a general duty medical officer, then, in the last nine years, in psychiatry, with particular expertise in post-traumatic stress disorder and associated operational stress injuries.

National Defence committee  In response to your first question, you need to realize that all people resist change. Organizations such as the Canadian Forces and the RCMP are steeped in tradition. It's very difficult to implement new types of programs, particularly if it goes against a belief system. The bel

National Defence committee  It's a very good question, and it's something I've revisited on a number of occasions with the military. First off, should we be concerned? Absolutely. A suicide death is a preventable death. If there are adequate resources available and they're accessible without stigma, and t

National Defence committee  It's difficult. On the one hand, if you have shorter tours of duty, given the small size of our army it means that people are going to have to rotate back into theatre much sooner. The advantage of a longer tour of duty, nine months or a year, is it allows other people back here

National Defence committee  Well, there are two parts to this thing. It is very difficult to screen and predict who is going to get PTSD. They attempted to do that in World War II, and basically you could flip a coin and be as effective as our screening procedures. So it's difficult to predict. Even if you

National Defence committee  I don't think I actually criticized the Liberal government. I was criticizing the Canadian Forces and its inability to move in a direction I thought was necessay. Certainly things are going in the right direction. It's much better than it was. There's still an issue around rese

Veterans Affairs committee  Thank you very much for this opportunity to address the committee. My background is that I'm a veteran. I served 22 years in the Canadian military as a doctor, and later as a psychiatrist. I'm an expert internationally and nationally in post-traumatic stress disorder. I currentl

Veterans Affairs committee  It's difficult. Talking about resilience getting worn down, I've been doing this a long time and to be honest, I feel worn down by Veterans Affairs. Initially, they were very good, but now they're obstructionist; they're restrictive. We have lay people typically overruling medica

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes. I deal almost exclusively with post-traumatic stress disorder, and about 49% of people with PTSD think about suicide; 19% actually act on it. I've been very fortunate. I think it's partly the therapeutic relationship and the bond I have as a fellow veteran. In all my years—

Veterans Affairs committee  I can't even put it into words. I'm the tip of the iceberg, though, compared to my veterans. I mean, they're living it; I'm having to deal with it, so it's different. It's so easy to correct. It just takes some political will, and we need to get some of the VAC senior bureaucrat

Veterans Affairs committee  Thank you.

Veterans Affairs committee  I just wanted to quickly address the whole issue of criteria. It seems that Veterans Affairs has gone towards the disability tax credit criteria. They've made it very difficult for individuals to actually be eligible for the criteria. It's interesting. In the U.S. they have wha

Veterans Affairs committee  Yes. I absolutely agree with that. The longer this takes, the more stress it creates for the veteran and family members—absolutely. I would add that this is not only a benefit for the caregivers. You have to realize that if the caregivers aren't there and veterans end up in long-

Veterans Affairs committee  That's a good question. Let me just say that there are some very good individuals with Veterans Affairs. I have to say that. I've had that experience. I've also had experiences with people that have been terrible. A lack of a quality assurance program and a lack of the ability f

Veterans Affairs committee  You can actually develop what's called vicarious PTSD as a result of being exposed over long periods of time to individuals who have untreated PTSD and are very symptomatic. Family members, that can be the kids, that can be the caregivers, etc., can actually develop their own men