A conservative estimate indicates that almost 30% of the U.S. population will be afflicted
with an anxiety disorder at some point in their lives, and preliminary data suggest
that this risk is increasing (
Kessler et al 2005a
). A significant proportion of people diagnosed with an anxiety disorder will experience
severe and chronic symptoms that can significantly interfere with the ability to carry
out normal daily activities and increase the risk of suicide (
Kessler et al 2005b
). Specific phobias, social phobia, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) constitute
the most prevalent anxiety disorders, and their incidence is likely to rise with increasing
numbers of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans and as the victims of Katrina and other
disaster survivors continue to process and cope with their losses. Recent estimates
indicate that at least 17% of Iraq veterans will develop PTSD, generalized anxiety
disorder, or depression, twice as many as would be expected before deployment and
four times that found in the general population (
Hogue et al 2004
). This figure does not include severely wounded or disabled veterans and thus likely
underestimates what the actual rates will be. Exposure to combat, duration of deployment,
and injury considerably increase the risk of developing mental health problems, particularly
with regard to PTSD. Although soldiers returning from Iraq are significantly more
likely to develop mental health problems, the majority of those who are diagnosed
with a psychiatric disorder and/or acknowledge that they have a problem will not seek
treatment for fear of being stigmatized (
Hogue et al 2004
). These findings emphasize the importance and urgency of not only finding effective
treatments for PTSD and other anxiety disorders but also for discovering ways to prevent
their onset. The development of new approaches to anxiety disorders that are based
on the basic neurobiology of extinction represents perhaps the best current opportunity
for translating neuroscience discoveries into clinical applications for the prediction,
pre-emption, and personalized treatment of a mental disorder.To read this article in full you will need to make a payment
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© 2006 Society of Biological Psychiatry. Published by Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
