Pain, Not Injury, Main Cause of US Military Evacuations

A survey conducted by researchers from Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore revealed that less than 15% of US military personnel evacuated from warzones in Iraq and Afghanistan over medical reasons had actually suffered from combat injuries.

The new study, published in a British medical journal the Lance, focuses on the medical problems of 34,000 US evacuees treated at a military hospital in Germany from 2004 to 2007, BBC reported.

The study, lead by Steven P. Cohen and his team, claims that serving U.S. soldiers are more likely to be withdrawn from the battlefield due to back, joint or muscle pain than combat injuries.

More than 85% of the withdrawals were due to musculoskeletal pains as well as everyday medical problems like gastro-intestinal infections, respiratory diseases, chest and spinal pain.

Combat injuries (14%) are the second most common, followed by neurological disorders (10%).

However, while psychiatric illnesses contributed to 9% of the evacuations in the studied cases, the study highlights that psychiatric problems of soldiers in Iraq had tripled to 14%, and nearly doubled in Afghanistan to 11%.

Other experts are now warning that the large number of soldiers with chronic physical pain suggests hidden psychiatric illnesses such as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.

The findings are similar to surveys on American medical evacuations during the wars in Vietnam and Korea, where combat wounds were also not the leading cause of evacuations.

The US War Department is reportedly rethinking the length of soldiers' tours of duty, and considering the weight of equipment that soldiers are routinely required.