The Veteran Supported Education Service Treatment Manual: VetSEd

Summarizing
The purpose of a summary is for you to reflect your understanding of a general topic of
discussion. Essentially, this is reflecting on a larger scale. For example, after 10 minutes
of discussion about a variety of interconnected topics (e.g., struggling in school, heavy
alcohol use, PTSD symptoms), you may want to consider summarizing the discussion in
order to help the Veteran make connections between them. Thus, you might say, “We’ve
talked about a few things in the past 10 minutes or so and what I’m hearing is that you
have concerns about your relationships with some people at school and also with your
professor. And that makes sense to me. These are important people in your life even if
you might wish they weren’t at this point. You also told me about your flashbacks in the
past week and how upset they’ve been making you. I also know from what you just told
me that you’re feeling more like starting to drink again. If you did go back to drinking,
how do you think it would affect these other problems?”
Connecting Veterans to Mental Health Providers
VetSEd services are best provided in the context of wraparound case management
supports. Wraparound case management provides VetSEd providers and the Veterans
with whom they work ready access to multidisciplinary providers who can render
evidenced-based treatments for COD. VetSEd providers are encouraged to talk with the
multidisciplinary providers with whom they work to determine what evidenced-based
treatments are available at their site. In addition, VetSEd providers are encouraged to
reflect on what treatment approaches they have utilized in their own recovery journey, as
sharing small snippets of one‘s recovery story as related to treatment experiences can
build Veteran motivation to access clinical services.
Relapse Prevention
The ultimate goal of Relapse Prevention (RP) is to teach the Veteran how to anticipate
and cope with ―triggers‖ (i.e., moods, thoughts or situations that increase the risk of
using) (Marlatt & Donovan, 2005). RP combines behavioral skills training with cognitive
interventions designed to prevent or limit the occurrence of relapse. Additionally,
psychoeducation is an important component of RP, as both the provider and the client
must identify expectations.
Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)
CBT is based on the assumption that negative feelings result from dysfunctional
thoughts, beliefs, and assumptions about the self, the future, and the world. At times,
Veterans you are working with may exhibit such negative feelings in the form of explicit,
verbal self-statements, otherwise known as negative self-talk.
CBT interventions are designed to help Veterans identify and alter negative self-talk and
related assumptions when they arise, as well as guide an examination of underlying
―cognitive schemas‖.
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