A series of alternative treatment options could soon be available in Florida to U.S. military veterans with traumatic brain injuries and/or post-traumatic stress disorder, under a law signed on June 28 by Gov. Ron DeSantis. The measure (HB 501) drew unanimous support from both the Florida House and Senate during the legislative session. It allows the Florida Department of Veteran Affairs to contract with a state university or Florida College System institution to provide the following alternative treatment options: accelerated resolution therapy, equine therapy, hyperbaric oxygen therapy, service animal training therapy, and music therapy. DeSantis, who served in the Navy, is a long time supporter of alternative-treatment concepts beyond or in addition to traditional talk therapy and medication.

Florida is home to many established arts and military programs, including two of eleven national clinical sites within the Creative Forces: NEA Military Healing Arts Network at the James A. Haley Veterans' Hospital in Tampa and the N. Florida/South Georgia Veterans Health System in Gainesville. Creative Forces supports creative arts therapies for service members with traumatic brain injury and associated psychological health issues. They are promoting the use of integrated care models that include alternative treatment options through research and best practice, hoping to stem the rate of suicide among returning servce members.

To serve Florida's rural veterans and their families, Creative Forces is working with the University of Florida's Center for Arts in Medicine and the N.Florida/S. Georgia Veterans Health Sysytem in Gainesville on their Rural Veterans TeleRehabilitation Initiative (RVTRI). The initiative will adapt art and dance/movement therapies to telehealth-based delivery and increase access to mental health care for our veterans.

Florida is also home to a Creative Forces Community Connections Project called VetArtSpan based at Tampa's Straz Center for the Arts. VetArtSpan will include multi-disciplinary arts engagement podcast networking, digital video programs, intimate veteran-civilian dialogs, an online art making gallery and resource website, offering increased arts accessibilty to expanded visual and performances at the Straz Center, including a Veterans Riverwalk Art Exhibit. Community collaborators on VetArtSpan are the Florida Department of State, Division of Cultural Affairs, University of South Florida school of Dance, the Morean Arts Center, the James Museum of Western & Wildlife Art, the Brain Science Institute of Johns Hopkins University, the ArtThread Foundation and the Military Reilience Foundation.

Visit the National Endowment for the Arts' website to read about Creative Forces: NEA MIlitary Healing Network research.

To locate national arts & military rogramming in your community and state, visit the National Initiative for Arts & Health in the Military at Americans for the Arts.