Virtual Counseling Gives Sailors More Mental Health Options
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy is using virtual counseling to help meet the mental health needs of its sailors, a panel of suicide prevention experts told reporters Thursday. There are currently 54 virtual counselors available, hired by Commander, Navy Installations Command, to help with the mental health needs of the fleet, Shauna Turner, CNIC Navy family readiness program director, told reporters. Those virtual counselors are actively responding to 597 cases. Creating more access to care is a priority for the sea service, Turner said. Virtual care is not replacing in-person counseling, Turner said. Instead, it is an additional resource that
Sailors man the rails on the flight deck of Nimitz-class aircraft carrier USS Nimitz (CVN-68) as the ship arrives at Naval Station Norfolk (NSN), Virginia, July 9, 2026. US Navy photo ARLINGTON, Va. — The Navy is using virtual counseling to help meet the mental health needs of its sailors, a panel of suicide prevention experts told reporters Thursday.
There are currently 54 virtual counselors available, hired by Commander, Navy Installations Command, to help with the mental health needs of the fleet, Shauna Turner, CNIC Navy family readiness program director, told reporters. Those virtual counselors are actively responding to 597 cases.
Creating more access to care is a priority for the sea service, Turner said.
Virtual care is not replacing in-person counseling, Turner said. Instead, it is an additional resource that sailors can use, while also giving the Navy the ability to provide more care for sailors who are in geographically remote or isolated areas.
“For us, expanding on that installation-based support, ensuring that sailors and families have access to support – clinical support – regardless of where they live and embedded where they work, was very important to us,” Turner said.
U.S. defense contractor Benjamin Reeves, a resilience counselor, conducts stress resiliency training aboard the Harpers Ferry-class dock landing ship USS Carter Hall (LSD 50), Oct. 17, 2023. US Navy photo Afloat, sailors still tend to use deployed resiliency counselors, who are embedded aboard aircraft carriers and some amphibious ships, she said.
Virtual care is not new. The Navy began the initiative in 2014, and it has grown each year, she said.
The 54 virtual counselors are also part of the Navy’s surge capacity. There are approximately four virtual counselors on each coast available to surge to a command that might need additional mental health services. If there is a man-made or natural disaster, all 54 virtual counselors will surge to provide services to the affected area, Turner said.
The Pentagon also has Special Psychiatric Rapid Intervention Teams (SPRINT) that are a part of military treatment facility teams that are sent to commands following a critical event, which can include a death, suicide or non-suicide, Cmdr. Katie Pierce, an operational psychologist in the Navy’s suicide prevention program, told reporters.
There’s also an Epi A team, created by the Pentagon, that goes to commands when there is a cluster of suicides. That team will do an epidemiological assessment to see what gaps exist in the command. The team usually includes Pentagon epidemiologists, as well as one or two people from the Defense Suicide Prevention Office. The service affected will also be part of the team, Pierce said.
The Navy continues to use deployed resiliency counselors, as well as embedded integrated prevention coordinators, Pierce said. About 40 percent of mental health providers are embedded on ships, she said.
An embedded mental health provider’s billet is purchased by the command requesting it, Pierce said. Then the billet is funded and owned by the command, rather than the military treatment facility.
