Doctors who are not connected with the VA but who see veterans need to ask them about any mental health issues they have, Kaplan said. "They need to be aware of the risks associated with veteran status, and in particular those who served in Iraq and Afghanistan," he said.

Kaplan added that it is not uncommon for problems such as PTSD to arise years, even decades, after service. "We don't know the full emotional toll of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan," he said.

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Simon A. Rego, associate director of psychology training at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City, says that "while the results may be somewhat inflated due to the researchers' inability to assess data on clinical outcomes, potential treatment outside of the VA system, or even subsequent deployments, they are nevertheless, stunning."

The authors found a much higher percentage of veterans enrolling in the VA now than at any other time in history: 41 percent since 2002 versus 10 percent of Vietnam veterans. And, Rego noted, new mental health diagnoses in 2008 were six times higher than in 2002 -- 37 percent versus 6.4 percent.

"An important and often overlooked finding here was that a lack of social support -- being separated, divorced, widowed, etc.-- may pose a serious risk for new post-deployment mental health problems," Rego said.

This underscores the need for ancillary social support services for returning veterans who are unmarried and/or without social support, he said. "All too often we focus on treating the symptoms but fail to address the individual's social context. Based on the data here, a failure to do so could lead to increased risk in developing new mental health problems."