Fort Campbell Cohort Study
Abstract
Considerable research shows that a significant minority of individuals will develop mental health issues following exposure to potentially traumatic stress, such as combat. Recent estimates have found that approximately 20% of those serving in US Operations in Iraq and Afghanistan develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Despite important advances made in the understanding and treatment of PTSD, to date, there is no prevention for PTSD and many individuals do not benefit from current therapeutic interventions. A growing body of evidence suggests that prevention programs and treatments will depend largely on a comprehensive understanding of the biological processes underlying adaptive and maladaptive responses to traumatic stress. In an effort to systematically understand how biological processes contribute to the mental health trajectories following exposure to combat, this group has been studying a cohort of US Army personnel from Fort Campbell, Kentucky. To date, 1,793 individuals were assessed up to 6 months post-deployment across the three phases. The data collected thus far is beginning to identify candidate genetic, blood, and neurocognitive markers that predict who does and does not develop PTSD pre-to-post deployment. The aim of this proposal is to advance diagnostic, subtyping, and prognostic biomarkers for PTSD in male and female Veterans and active duty personnel. This will be accomplished by the following: (1) utilizing male active duty Service members in the Fort Campbell Cohort (FCC) as an external validation sample for advancing multi-omic diagnostic panels we have identified in two male Iraq and Afghanistan Veteran samples from our PTSD Systems Biology Consortium; (2) determining PTSD trajectories across Phases 1 to 4 and pre-deployment predictors of these trajectories; (3) determining trajectories for related psychiatric and medical disorders, functioning, and biomarkers, predictors of these trajectories and the relationship of these trajectories to the PTSD trajectories; (4) determining predictors of resilience across the four phases; and (5) utilizing the FCC combined with a female sample from our PTSD Systems Biology Consortium as an exploratory discovery sample for advancing multi-omic panels for diagnosing PTSD in females. This cohort will serve as an external validation sample for panels A, B, C and combined panel of multi-omic biomarkers for PTSD.
Document Details
- Document Type
- DoD Grant Award
- Publication Date
- Nov 19, 2019
- Source ID
- W81XWH1910844
Entities
People
- Charles Marmar
Organizations
- Grossman School of Medicine
- United States Army