Psychiatric Care in the Military Community: Family and Military Stressors

Unique challenges confront members of the military community. Military families must deal with prolonged absences by active-duty spouses and parents, frequent moves, isolation from the civilian community, and the potential loss of a family member in war or preparation for war. The active-duty service member faces the dangers of combat, including the threat presented by chemical and biological warfare, and the increasingly sophisticated technical demands of modern military equipment. The authors review psychiatric stressors that affect service members and their families and highlight aspects of military psychiatry that have implications for the practice of community psychiatry.