After Assaults

"The most difficult part of my job is that I have so much job security," says Anne Sadler, coordinator of the post-traumatic stress

Sexual trauma has become an increasingly significant issue for VA because it affects women disproportionately, and the population of female veterans is growing rapidly. In 1982, there were 740,000; now there are 1.7 million. "The VA is an institution that has faced the challenge of changing a health care system that used to be oriented toward men to integrate women," Sadler says. The agency began treating women for sexual trauma, which includes harassment, assault, rape and other violence, after the passage of the 1992 Veterans Health Care Act. In 1994, it expanded sexual trauma counseling to men, and now provides such counseling at all its hospitals and many of its vet centers.