I have been a patient at a VA hospital in the past. I had no problems. I thought they did a great job. I thought the staff was dedicated to taking care of vets. You could eat off the floor of that hospital it was so clean.
The current controversy about vets not being able to be seen for months never happened to me. Apparently at other VAs it has happened and "resulted in some deaths". Would they have died anyway? Who knows? Maybe.
There is no doubt that veterans deserve care, the highest level of care. The fact that there are problems at some hospitals isn't surprising. Like the rest of healthcare, they are trying to provide care with limited money just like all other hospitals. They are dealing with thousands of people they were not ready to deal with. Its kind of like what Obamacare will do to non VA hospitals.
I agree this should be fixed What bothers me about it is the fact that politicians, 90% of whom never served in the military, use this issue to get their face in the news. Perhaps thinking this will help them get re-elected.
On the backs of veterans.
This country has a lot of guilt about veterans. We have essentially hired a mercenary army to fight our wars for us. Doing that makes war so much easier. Your son or daughter or YOU don't have to be deployed 3-4 times or come back in a body bag.
Guilt comes in the form of "thank you for your service", blah blah blah. We watch those moving videos showing veterans showing up at their childrens school. We may shed a tear or two. While you are thanking and crying, soldiers remain in Iraq, Afghanistan, Korea, now Nigeria risking their lives daily, while you go about your life back here. We don't give them much thought. Why would we? It doesn't involve us.
Bring back the draft.
I probably wouldn't use "mercenary army" to describe the veterans of our country. Despite this I agree with most of your sentiments. My husband is active duty, which makes us an active duty family. Our guilt should provide good care for those men and women who have chosen to defend our country, regardless of hospital problems.
ReplyDeleteWhat scares me most is that this just confirms to me the effect Obama care will have on our healthcare system. Can't we see that this is Obama care already in action?
This past year I noticed a dramatic change in our healthcare. Although I believe we receive good healthcare, typically we don't have many issues because we are a generally healthy family. This year my elementary school daughter broke her ankle. It took 6 weeks to finally get her to a physical therapist, after she had healed, because we had to wait for specialty care. Once she presented to PT, she was able to learn to walk correctly again within a couple of weeks with a series of 3-30 min appts. While I was frustrated and believed it decreased her quality of life, I knew that her waiting was a sign of the future to come in healthcare.
Wake up and smell the coffee America! If they will do this to someone who fought for your freedom they will certainly do this to you.
While we are at it make women have to sign up for select service. Men should not be the only ones to sign up for it. If women want to be equal it should be equal across the board. I am female. I am a vet.
ReplyDeleteThe VA had a surplus of money last year. The VA I go to spent their money on a new cafeteria that we don't need and new huge chairs that we did not need. Why did we have a hiring freeze of doctors and nurses? OH yea, the shut down! Don't blame all of this on the VA not having money. Blame this on Congress and their croneys. I see it first hand what it is doing.
I am currently without a primary care doctor. It has been four months since I have been able to get seen for a general health care thing outside of the ED. How is that supposed to work? I have something minor go wrong, and I have to go to the ED? I refuse. So yes, you can die of things that go unreported, if you do not know what is going on. The "report" that came out of this VA said everything was on the up and up too! OH yea, perfect.