Week of July 30, 2012

A judge in Oakland, Calif. has issued a court order requiring the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to hand over more documents about its Cold War-era drug experiments on thousands of Vietnam veterans. U.S. Magistrate Judge Jacqueline Scott Corley said the documents requested were "squarely relevant" to the claim that the government failed to adequately notify veterans of the chemicals they were exposed to and what that exposure might do to their health. A class action lawsuit filed by the Vietnam Veterans of America and individual soldiers in 2009 claimed that the Army and the CIA used at least 7,800 veterans as human guinea pigs for testing the effects of up to 400 types of drugs and chemicals beginning in the 1950s under several project code names including "Bluebird," "Artichoke" and "MKUltra," and "Project Paperclip."

Week of June 18, 2012

It shouldn’t take a government agency (VA) very long to verify a medical record that came from another government agency (one of the Armed Forces).  Most, if not all, of the documentation in question in these medical records has already been checked and rechecked multiple times prior to it reaching VA for a claim.  In some cases, VA has even ran tests then required the claimant to undergo the same exact tests they contract out to a civilian agency (VES – Veterans Evaluation Services) for no apparent reason other than to drag the process out even longer.   The only thing that VA is doing when they drag their feet in the claims process is costing the TAX PAYERS more money.  These claims should be processed, start to finish, within 90 days.  There is no reason to drag them out for these lengthy periods, it only causes unwanted stress and hardship on the service member and their families, which none of them deserve.

For years now the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has rejected legitimate claims by Servicemen on the hopes that the claimant wouldn’t pursue any further action because of the length of time they (VA) take to make their decision.  In most cases, a claim can go unsettled for 12-18 months or longer.  Depending on the determination from VA that 12-18 month period gets paid in a lump sum to the claimant.  This amount could range anywhere between a couple thousand dollars ($2,000), to forty five to fifty thousand dollars ($45,000 – $50,000), to hundreds of thousands of dollars (these figures are just base amounts and do not include anything extra).  With the number of returning Servicemen this country is expecting and the percentage which will ETS or retire, wouldn’t it be in VA’s best interest to settle these claims in a timely manner rather than dragging them out for months or even years like our Vietnam Veterans have encountered.  Some of our Vietnam veterans are receiving million dollar checks from the government due to these ridiculous processes.

If VA is under staffed and cannot handle what is required of them to process these claims in a respectable amount of time, our Government Leaders should step in and do what it takes to make sure we are taken care of.  We, as Serviceman, never hesitated in completing our mission(s) to guarantee the safety and well-being of this country! Why does it take VA so long to CARE for US after we ETS or Retire?  One VET without a home, medical care, or the benefits they DESERVE is ONE too many!!!!!

Jeffrey L. Thomas served in the U.S. Army and Indiana Army National Guard. He retired after 22 years of service. He is married and has six children and proud grandfather of one. Jeffrey has been waiting on his disability claim for 16 months. He currently lives with a family member, receiving food stamps, and trying to stay positive.

May 21, 2011 • Ben Krause

VA health care workers and benefits processors are receiving new training in how to handle disability evaluations for veterans claiming traumatic brain injuries after an internal investigation found a high percentage of errors on those types of claims.

A May 18 report by the VA Inspector General says a spot review of disability claims found an 8 percent error rate in claims related to post-traumatic stress disorder and a 19 percent error rate in claims related to traumatic brain injury.

Half of the PTSD claims and slightly more than half of the TBI claims affected benefits, according to the report.

Overall, the IG found a 23 percent error rate in the cases it reviewed, stemming mainly from the fact that 82 percent of claims involved temporary 100 percent disability ratings for veterans who needed surgery or a specific treatment for their service-connected disability. The majority of these errors were technical and did not affect benefits, the report said.

For PTSD-related claims, a review of 16,000 files processed between April 2009 and July 2010 found that the VA employees processing claims lacked enough experience and training to be accurate.

The single biggest mistake was failing to verify a specific event or events in service that resulted in the stress, something that became easier in July 2010 when VA rules were amended so a veteran’s statement by itself is considered sufficient evidence. However, one-quarter of the errors resulted from assigning incorrect effective dates to claims, and about 20 percent of the errors involved incorrect mental health evaluations.

VA officials said they believe the problems with PTSD cases are resolved but will continue to monitor accuracy.

For TBI, investigators looked at 4,100 claims completed from April 2009 through July 2010 and found 800 were processed incorrectly. Like the problems with PTSD claims, the chief problem was inexperience and undertrained staff, the report said.

Eighty-four percent of the errors were the result of problems with medical examinations being either inadequate or incorrect in identifying the symptoms of TBI and whether there were residual disabilities that coexisted with other mental conditions.

In response to the report, VA benefits and health care officials said they are working to ensure that compensation and pension examiners are trained in the proper procedures and will require regional offices that process benefits to provide a second reviewer for many TBI-related claims. A rater will be allowed to work without a reviewer only if they have achieved a 90 percent accuracy rate on 10 consecutive TBI cases, VA officials said in their formal response to the report.

Training for medical personal in proper exam procedures should be completed by June 30, but the new process for second reviews of TBI cases will not take effect until Sept. 30.

St. Louis, MO (KSDK) - Some veterans in the St. Louis region are still having surgery and dental procedures canceled or postponed two months after the all clear was given at the St. Louis VA Medical Center.

Officials suspended all procedures on February 2, 2011 after an employee found a surgical tray pitted with corrosion. Multiple investigations took place and more than 200 surgeries scheduled at the facility were instead performed at other St. Louis hospitals at tax payer's expense.

The center reopened March 10, more than a month after closure. VA experts, along with private vendors and independent consultants, examined the sterilization processing department and determined it was safe to start surgeries again.  But veterans are still having surgeries and dental procedures postponed.

The hold up, according to VA officials, has to do with the decision to replace or restore 63,000 dental and surgical instruments.

"We have a patient safety culture here. We wanted to make sure when the instruments come out that we felt comfortable using them on patients," said Dr. Michael Crittenden, Chief of Surgery.

He explained the enormity and complexity of the restoration process takes time.  But veterans tell the I-Team, all of that time is taking a toll on services they've earned.

The surgery center is operating only at 70 percent while the dental clinic hasn't done any restorative work like fillings or crowns in four months. Routine dental cleanings are taking place at 60 percent of what it was prior to the February closure.

One patient, who feared speaking on camera, said she had three appointments canceled since February and worries about losing some of her teeth.

"It just makes my blood boil that any veteran would be put in that situation but also, these are lingering problems from what has happened months and months and months ago," said Congressman Russ Carnahan, who spearheaded a campaign for investigations and congressional hearings. 

National Dental Labs contacted by the I-Team, say restoring dental instruments should take three days.  So why after eight weeks are surgeries and dental procedures still being canceled?

Aesculap, a German company, is restoring the VA's instruments at its Hazelwood facility.  A company vice president told the I-Team, "We have been working with St. Louis VA since mid-February...we don't control what we receive and when...but it's typically a three day turn around."

VA officials insist it is not a procurement or bureaucratic red tape problem. Dr. Crittenden said turnaround is taking longer than three days but he is very pleased with the quality of work Aesculap has provided.

He said if a patient has a dental emergency, the VA will pay for an outside dentist. Dr. Crittenden said they've paid for outside services more than 100 times since the February closure.
Officials at the VA hope to be back to 100 percent capacity at both the surgical and dental centers sometime in the next two weeks.

The sterilization concern was the second in less than a year at the Cochran center. In 2010, faulty sterilization at the center's dental clinic raised concerns that 1,812 veterans were potentially exposed to hepatitis and HIV. Most of those veterans have been tested and no cases of HIV or hepatitis have been connected to the dental clinic.

A Congressional hearing titled "Sacred Obligation: Restoring Veteran Trust and Patient Safety," is now taking place in Washington, D.C.