“We should make it clear that getting help isn’t a sign of weakness—it’s a sign of strength,” – Michelle Obama
Department of Defense leadership, including those within the military, have spent many years trying to curb fears that seeking mental health care will not have an impact on a career or on a security clearance.
Despite memorandums, briefings, courses and service members coming forward with their own struggles with mental health, and their career success in spite of those challenges, the stigma still lingers.
In a recent update, the DoD has even released a new DoD Instruction that changes the command notification requirements regarding the private nature of mental health care service and the guidelines that pertain to confidentiality.
According to DoD Instruction 6490.08, the Command Notification Requirements to Dispel Stigma in Providing Mental Health Care to Service Members, “promotes reducing stigma in obtaining mental health care services by balancing patient confidentiality with a commander’s need to know certain information for military operational and risk management decisions, ensuring, except in a case in which there is an exigent circumstance, the confidentiality of mental health care services provided to members who voluntarily seek such services.”
“If you need or want help, please go see someone. You have lots of options” within the DOD, said U.S. Navy Capt. (Dr.) Kenneth Richter, director for mental health policy and oversight, office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs.
But what about Security Clearances? Will mental health care affect a clearance?
NCSC Assistant Director for Special Security Directorate Mark Frownfelter emphasized the value in seeking mental help. He said, “It’s a sign of strength.”
Frownfelter stated that the federal government has made major strides in the clearance process by reducing barriers for applicants, which includes updating the infamous SF-86 form; more specifically, question 21 which asks if the applicant has received any treatment for mental health conditions in the previous seven years. He stated that a new questionnaire is still about a year away.
In a white paper titled, Mental Health Stigma and the U.S. Security Clearance Review Process, by Leidos, “a significant majority of security clearance applicants (80%) agree that seeking mental health should be considered positively in the investigation process; however, a smaller percentage (62%) believe investigators and adjudicators view seeking mental healthcare in the same positive light.”
The paper continued, “in the survey, nearly half (48%) of prospective applicants think that current mental health issues will hurt an individual’s clearance adjudication and 41% believe that past mental health issues will do that same.”
It is important that clearance applicants and holders feel welcome and supported, stated Leidos Vice President of Customer Excellence, Cynthia Strand.
Empathy is critical in the overall equation, stated Strand. When anyone is hired to support the security clearance process, empathy needs to be emphasized.
“Everyone in the security process represents the system – from security officers to investigators to adjudicators,” Strand continued.
The Data
According to Security Executive Agent Directive 4, by the DoD, there are 13 guidelines that can lead to a Service Member having their clearance revoked.
Guideline I, or issue nine, is Psychological Conditions, which means that there is a potential for BH issue to affect a clearance.
But according to the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency, of the nearly 5.4 millions clearances adjudicated by the DCSA since 2023, only 1.8% of those involved psychological conditions.
To go further down the ‘rabbit hole’, the cases of denied or revoked clearances based solely on psychological conditions since 2012 was just 68, or 0.00115%.
The agency has also analyzed nearly 100,000 cases going back to 2012 and found “no cases in which somebody, for simply seeking mental healthcare, failed to get or lost a clearance,” Dr. Michael Priester, chief psychologist for DCSA’s adjudications division, said in an interview with Military Times.
This data is vital to our formations and personnel. Communicating this data up and down the command structure will allow the talent pool to understand that despite mental health concerns, and any past or future of seeking support, will not directly lose you or deny you a clearance.
“We’re really pleased to have that information to bring to the table,” Priester said.
“You need to keep an eye on the central security concern, which is not your health,” Meyer told the interviewer. “Security really isn’t concerned about your health, that’s your doctor’s job
