Promoting Resilience among Veterans Using Wilderness Therapy

Abstract

Objective.-To create a longitudinal wilderness medicine curriculum or track that can be incorporated into an emergency medicine (EM) residency program. Methods.-Interest-specific tracks are becoming increasingly popular in EM training. We chose this model to develop our curriculum specific to wilderness medicine (WM). This curriculum may be incorporated into an EM training program. This training would facilitate transition to a WM fellowship or other career in the field for the interested resident. Outlined is a 3-year longitudinal course of study that includes a core didactic curriculum and a plan for graduated levels of responsibility. The core content is specifically related to the required EM core content for residency training. The track enhances the WM specific core content for the EM residents as a whole, in addition to providing each WM track resident with additional focused WM didactics, skills, and teaching opportunities. Finally, the track allows the resident to align his or her research, didactic, and administrative project requirements of the EM program within the field of WM study. The WM track curriculum is easily modified to fit the particular needs of individual residency programs. Results.-We present a model core content curriculum for a WM track for training within an EM training program. Conclusions.-This WM curriculum would give residencies a framework that can be used to foster learning for the residents interested WM. It enhances the coverage of wilderness core content education for all of the EM residents in the program. It provides wilderness-and environmental-specific education and experience for interested residents, allowing them to focus on an area of study, enhancing their CVs at graduation. Finally, given the popularity of WM, the presence of a WM track may potentially improve recruitment for the residency program.

Adolescent Wilderness Therapy: The Relationship of Client Outcomes to Reasons for Referral, Motivation for Change, and Clinical Measures

“…Because of the shortage, outdoor therapy from private organizations appeals to parents and clinicians when other mental health interventions are unavailable or have not elicited the desired outcome. There are numerous types of outdoor therapy for numerous types of clients, including cancer survivors [5], youth experiencing mental health concerns [6], adjudicated adolescent populations [7], those experiencing concerns of substance misuse [8], adolescent sexual offenders [9], post-traumatic stress disorder and military veterans [10], and reunifying foster care siblings [11].…”