Effectiveness of In-Theater Mental Health Assessments.

INTRODUCTION: The leading cause for medical evacuation from the U.S. Central Command area of responsibility is because of mental health conditions. The In-Theater Mental Health Assessment (ITMHA) is a DoD-required screening of deployed personnel. It is vital to examine the efficacy of ITMHA's potential to significantly impact the mental health outcomes of service members. MATERIALS AND METHODS: All ITMHA results of individuals in 2 deployed Army battalions along with a brigade headquarters deployed to U.S. Central Command between October 2022 and October 2023 were collected and analyzed. Descriptive statistics were used to characterize the results of the ITMHA. RESULTS: Of 670 deployed service members, 157 (23%) scored positive on ITMHA. Ten service members were referred for additional mental health evaluation. The remaining 147 (22%) service members who scored positive were not referred because of a lack of significant impairment or were already engaged in mental health services. One service member in the study was evacuated because of a mental health condition. The most common major life stressors identified were family/relationship issues, sleep problems, and mental health concerns. CONCLUSIONS: The number of deployed personnel identified through the ITMHA as requiring mental health care was modest. The ITMHA has multiple limitations that, if addressed, will improve its utility to mitigate mental health decline in the expeditionary environment.

clifford B.4.1 , an allele of CG1603 , causes tissue overgrowth in the Drosophila melanogaster eye.

Mutant B.4.1 , generated via EMS mutagenesis in Drosophila melanogaster , was studied by undergraduate students participating in the Fly-CURE. After inducing genetically mosaic tissue in the adult eye, B.4.1 mutant tissue displays a robust increase in cell division and a rough appearance. Complementation mapping and sequence analysis identified a nonsense mutation in the gene CG1603 , which we named clifford ( cliff ) due to observed increases in red-pigmented mutant tissue compared to controls. cliff encodes a zinc finger-containing protein implicated in transcriptional control. RNAi knockdown of cliff similarly results in rough eyes, confirming a role for Cliff in eye development.