Group and family treatment of post-traumatic stress disorder.

A central feature of PTSD is its effect on social relationships. Trauma affects groups of people, not just individuals. Family systems, neighborhoods, and even whole generations may feel the results of psychological trauma. Because of the social nature of the effects of trauma, post-trauma treatment must address an individual's relationship to others. Group and family psychotherapy are ideally suited to this and are important components of a multimodal approach to PTSD treatment. Group and family psychotherapies provide superb opportunities for social support, social reintegration, and interpersonal learning. As with any powerful technique, these methods must be carefully applied. Although not all patients are appropriate for exposure-based treatments, improved interpersonal coping skills will likely be beneficial to many PTSD patients. Patients should be carefully evaluated for treatment types and assessed for treatment response. Although group and family therapies currently provide relief and growth for PTSD patients, many considerations remain for the future. For example, how can patients be matched with various treatments for optimal results? How should acute and chronic PTSD treatments be similar and different? What is the effectiveness of group and family therapies for PTSD? What are the social and legal implications of a prolonged course of treatment for a victim whose children meanwhile are being traumatized by the parent's relatively poor parenting skills secondary to their inadequacies and disabilities? Finally, at a global level, how do we improve systems therapy technology to enable us more radically, effectively, and quickly to bring about total systems change? Because families and groups are the "cells" that compose the "vital organs" we call nations, and these nations in turn make the total body of humankind, the answers to these questions may have a significant determining effect on the future survival of us all.