ArticleMedical care2015
Long-term disability associated with war-related experience among Vietnam veterans: retrospective cohort study.
Article in Medical care, 2015. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 12 papers, 1 of them a synthesis that pooled it.
What it found
Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.
The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.
The trial behind it
Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.
Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.
Who cites it
12 citing papers in PubMed, 1 synthesis or guideline pooled it, 15 citations in OpenAlex.
- Pooled it
- Parental Emotional Socialization and Child Mental Health After a Military Parenting Program: A Baseline Target Moderated Mediation Model.Prevention science : the official journal of the Society for Prevention Research · 2025Trial
- Transformation of Ukrainian students' attitudes toward wheelchair users amid the Russian-Ukrainian war.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Chronic Itch Among Soldiers and Civilians: A Cross-sectional Study During the War in Ukraine.Acta dermato-venereologica · 2025Article
- Suicide Ideation, Plans, and Attempts Among Military Veterans vs Nonveterans With Disability.JAMA network open · 2023Article
- Use of home care services by older Veterans and dependants in Melbourne, Australia, 2007-2016.Journal of military, veteran and family health · 2023Article
- Geographic Distribution of Disability Among Older Veterans, United States, 2013-2017.Preventing chronic disease · 2020Article
- Low-level cognitive ability in young adulthood and other risk factors of depression in an observational cohort study among deployed Danish soldiers.Social psychiatry and psychiatric epidemiology · 2019Observational
- The health and wellbeing needs of veterans: a rapid review.BMC psychiatry · 2017Review
- Enhancing health and independent living for veterans with disabilities by leveraging community-based resources.Journal of multidisciplinary healthcare · 2017Article
- Disability and Mental Disorders in the Canadian Armed Forces.Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie · 2016Article
- The impact of war on mental health: lest we forget.World psychiatry : official journal of the World Psychiatric Association (WPA) · 2015Article
Corrections and comments
PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.
Authors and funding
3 authors at 3 institutions in 2 countries.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
backgroundRecent combat operations have involved large numbers of personnel. Long-term health effects of military deployment remain largely unknown.
objectivesTo examine patterns and trends in long-term disability among combat veterans and to relate disability to aspects of wartime experience.
participantsA total of 60,228 Australian military personnel deployed between 1962 and 1975 during the Vietnam War, and 82,877 military personnel who were not deployed overseas. OUTCOME MEASURES: Accepted physician-assessed disability claims were evaluated over follow-up periods up to 50 years after deployment, and compared with age-matched controls. Multivariable analysis was used to examine differences by service branch, rank, age, and deployment duration.
resultsThe steepest rise in disability incidence was observed among Vietnam veterans starting in the 1990s, around 20-30 years after deployment for most veterans. After 1994, when Statements of Principles were introduced to guide evaluation of disability claims, the hazard ratio for disability incidence was 1.53 (95% confidence interval, 1.32-1.77) compared with the prior period. By January 2011, after an average follow-up of 42.5 years, 69.7% (95% confidence interval, 69.4%-70.1%) of veterans had at least 1 war-related disability. Many veterans had multiple disabilities, with leading causes being eye and ear disorders (48.0%), mental health conditions (47.9%), and musculoskeletal disorders (18.4%). For specific categories of disability, relative risks for accepted claims among veterans compared with controls were highest for mental health disorders, at 22.9 (21.9-24.0) and lowest for injuries, at 1.5 (1.4-1.6) with a relative risk for any disability of 3.7 (3.7-3.8). Veterans with service of >1 year were 2.5 (2.2-2.7) times more likely to have a mental health disability than those who served <100 days, and 2.3 (2.1-2.5) times more likely to have other disabilities.
conclusionsLong-term effects of deployment into military conflicts are substantial, and likelihood of war-related disability is associated with service history. If similar patterns follow from more recent conflicts, significant additional resources will be needed to prevent and treat long-term health conditions among veterans.
Indexed as
Identifiers
What OpenQuestion holds
Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.