Coming Home to Die of Drug Interactions

The wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have returned 40,000 wounded soldiers to the US, the highest number, compared to combat deaths, of any war in history. Another 300,000 or more troops have returned with traumatic brain injury, P.T.S.D. (post traumatic stress disorder), depression, or chronic pain; difficult to treat conditions our troops will likely suffer from for many years. As a result, psychiatric drugs, central nervous system depressants, and narcotic painkillers have been used by military doctors more than in any previous war. But those medications are being increasingly linked to a rising tide of other problems, among them drug dependency, suicide, and fatal accidents—sometimes from the interaction of the drugs themselves. An Army report on suicide released last year noted that medications were involved in one-third of the record 162 suicides by active-duty soldiers in 2009. An additional 101 soldiers died accidentally from the toxic mixing of prescription drugs from 2006 to 2009. DNA testing can help improve this situation because almost all of the drugs contributing to the drug interactions afflicting our troops are affected by DNA status. When prescribers know the DNA status of their patients, they’re in a better position know when drugs or combinations of drugs will work or when they might be unsafe. Adapted from “For Some Troops, Powerful Drug Cocktails Have Deadly Results,” The New York Times, Feb. 12, 2011