Veterans pilot program good investment

Among several bills in the New Mexico legislative hopper is one that would fund a pilot program to help New Mexico veterans who have post-traumatic stress disorder.

After more than a decade of war and as the U.S. presence in Afghanistan starts to wind down, hundreds if not thousands of veterans are returning home with wounds, both physical and mental.

House Bill 36, introduced by state Rep. Dianne Hamilton, a Silver City Republican, seeks to appropriate $250,000 from the general fund for the Veterans' Services Department to set up the program that would test whether virtual reality therapy treatment works for veterans.

The money would fund the program for fiscal years 2013 through 2017 at Western New Mexico University in Silver City.

It would pay for setting up a curriculum for development of a master's degree in social work and would train therapists and treat rural veterans.

PTSD's cost to veterans, their families and society due to chronic care, lost productivity and suicide is great. If this program can demonstrate that this type of treatment is effective, it could result in overall savings in health care costs and, more importantly, restore lives damaged in the course of U.S. military service to productive ones.

— Albuquerque Journal