Exposures of concern to veterans returning from Afghanistan and Iraq.

Abstract

There is a long history of Veterans returning from war with concerns regarding environmental hazards that they may have experienced while in theater. The author describes some of the tools in place within the Department of Defense to capture the frequency and nature of exposure concerns of returning troops. This article then reviews the exposures of concern to Service members returning from military service in the current and recent conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq. The author then presents some of the recent published literature on these concerns. To address these exposure concerns of Veterans, there is then a brief discussion of a new program being put in place at the Department of Veterans Affairs.