Symposium focuses on assessment and treatment for Veterans and returning service members

RANCHO CORDOVA, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Health Net Federal Services, LLC, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Health Net, Inc. (NYSE:HNT) that operates within its Government Contracts segment, today announced its continued partnership with Penn State Milton S. Hershey Medical Center and Penn State College of Medicine and the American Red Cross, through its Service to the Armed Forces program, to promote the first of four symposiums entitled, “Meeting the Needs of Returning Military Service Members,” for primary care physicians and behavioral health professionals in the TRICARE North Region.

“We are committed to ensuring health care professionals are equipped to address the growing primary care and behavioral health needs of our Veterans and active duty service members,” said Thomas Carrato, president, Health Net Federal Services. “The symposium is designed to help improve physicians’ and behavioral health professionals’ understanding, assessment and treatment of the invisible wounds of war, including post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and traumatic brain injury (TBI). Meeting the needs of Veterans and military service members is a vital support needed to maintain the resiliency of our service members and their families.”

Topics that are scheduled to be discussed at the symposium include PTSD assessment tools and list factors that impact screening among military personnel; emerging technologies that support psychological health and brain injury recovery in the military community; mechanisms of injury and Department of Defense diagnostic criteria for mild, moderate, severe and penetrating TBI; clinical practice guidelines for the management of mild TBI in non-deployed settings; contrasting the components of a differential diagnosis of TBI and/or PTSD; and understanding challenges faced by returning service members and program benefits available to them.

The symposium is scheduled to be conducted by leaders from the Center for Deployment Psychology at the Uniformed Services University, the National Center for Tele-health and Technology, and the Defense and Veterans Brain Injury Center. Penn State College of Medicine is accredited by the Accreditation Council of Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians and behavioral health professionals. This symposium has been designated for 6.75 continuing medical education (CME) hours.

The full-day symposium will be held July 14, 2012, at the Holiday Inn Crystal City, 2650 Jefferson Davis Highway in Arlington, Va. Interested health care professionals can register online, by fax or by mail. Registration details can be found at: www.pennstatehershey.org/ce.

Three additional symposiums are scheduled in 2012, including sites in New York City, Watertown, N.Y., and Dayton, Ohio.

The TRICARE North Region includes Connecticut, Delaware, Illinois, Indiana, Kentucky (except Fort Campbell), Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin and the District of Columbia. In addition, the TRICARE North Region covers a small portion of Missouri and Iowa.

About Health Net

Health Net, Inc. is a publicly traded managed care organization that delivers managed health care services through health plans and government-sponsored managed care plans. Its mission is to help people be healthy, secure and comfortable. Health Net, through its subsidiaries, provides and administers health benefits to approximately 5.6 million individuals across the country through group, individual, Medicare (including the Medicare prescription drug benefit commonly referred to as “Part D”), Medicaid, U.S. Department of Defense, including TRICARE, and Veterans Affairs programs. Health Net’s behavioral health services subsidiary, Managed Health Network, Inc., provides behavioral health, substance abuse and employee assistance programs to approximately 4.9 million individuals, including Health Net’s own health plan members. Health Net’s subsidiaries also offer managed health care products related to prescription drugs, and offer managed health care product coordination for multi-region employers and administrative services for medical groups and self-funded benefits programs.

For more information on Health Net, Inc., please visit Health Net’s website at www.healthnet.com.

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Health Net Federal Services Contact:
Molly Tuttle
(916) 351-5355
molly.m.tuttle@healthnet.com
or
Health Net, Inc. Contact:
Margita Thompson
(818) 676-7912
margita.thompson@healthnet.com

Source: Health Net, Inc.