Veterans Affairs Drops Ball on 1.5 MILLION Cases!

If there's one thing worse than sending men and women overseas to fight for ill-defined reasons, it's abandoning them in moments of need after they've returned to the U.S. Cue the latest story, from the Washington Examiner, about just how rotten the Department of Veterans Affairs really is.

More than 1.5 million medical orders were canceled by the Department of Veterans Affairs without any guarantee the patients received the treatment or tests they needed, the Washington Examiner has found.

Since May 2013, veterans' medical centers nationwide have been under pressure to clear out 2 million backlogged orders for patient care or services.

They were given wide latitude to cancel unfilled appointments more than 90 days old. By April 2014, the backlog of what the agency calls "unresolved consults" was down to about 450,000.

What happened to other 1.5 million appointments is something that no one, including top officials at the veterans' agency, can answer.

More here.

A few months ago, Reason TV's Amanda Winkler asked "Is Government Bureaucracy Failing Our Veterans?" Watch below:

Comments

[The Last American Hero]

The ACA - a VA for the rest of us!

[SusanM]

That's so funny I'm crying.

[WTF]

The Last American Hero|5.1.14 @ 12:56PM|#

The ACA - a VA for the rest of us

Well, don't you want everyone to be equal?

[Rich]

"There are weak system designs that really allow for manipulation if that's what's desired."

So, exactly.

[wareagle]

yup...had the exact same thought.

[flye]

Once the VA moves to single-payer, that will fix everything.

[Pro Libertate]

Single-slayer you mean? Or is that single-slayer?

My tolerance for government incompetence, corruption, and dishonesty is reaching new lows. Surprisingly, as I didn't think it could get lower.

[Pro Libertate]

Sorry for the double slayer. The second one is supposed to be single-flayer.

[Lady Bertrum]

"Sorry"

That excuse won't cut it with Ramsey Snow the ultimate flayer.

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

Don't hate the flayer, hate the game.

[flye]

You said slayer twice.

[Dweebston]

But is he right, or is he right?

[Mad Scientist]

That just means ProL has something in common with the gods.

[flye]

Charming, sign right here!

A drummer I know once played with a death metal band -- they had one quick practice and a gig the next night. After he sets up they're like, "great, here's your cloak."

All I could think of is that Tenacious D lyric, "Dio, time to go, you must give your cape and scepter to me!"

[Doctor Whom]

That was my first thought, too, except that work got in the way of my saying so.

[albo]

The VA concept and system is fine. All we need is the right people in charge. Put the VA under the control of a progressive, caring Democratic administration and everything will be fixed!

[Doctor Whom]

But don't you see? Obama is powerless against the government-hating teathuglicans who have the executive branch in their iron fists. This is what progressives of my acquaintance actually believe.

[albo]

A RETHUGLICAN RAN OVER MY DOG!

[Free Society]

Obama is too busy defending women in the war against them to bother with those millions of government created dependents they've left out in the cold.

[Pro Libertate]

ERROR. . .ERROR. STERILIZE.

[BakedPenguin]

V-ger could only improve the VA. Or the rest of government.

[JW]

V-ger? Now you have committed another error.

Sterilize him, ProL.

[Pro Libertate]

It's not his fault. Who'd think they'd reboot that episode for their first film?

[Rasilio]

Nothing about the VA surprises me.

You are talking about a system that lost my father for nearly 2 weeks.

They literally lost him, he's on 100% va disability for a few things related to his 2 tours in Vietnam (among his list of ailments were COPD, Heart problems including having had more than a dozen heart attacks, diabetes, severe ptsd, and a handful of other things) and was suffering from some kind of severe infection causing a 105 degree fever so my mother took him to the nearest ER where he was admitted. My mother went back home that evening gathered up some supplies and returned the following morning where she was told that the VA had asked for him to be transferred to a VA facility. However the VA had no record of where he was and when they sent him to the VA facility they did not include ANY of his medical records or even a list of medications he was on so they parked him in a mental ward because he was incoherent (well duh 105 degree fever and loss of access to his psychoactive drugs will do that) and essentially left him to die. Meanwhile it took 12 days for my mother to track him down and get his medical treatment back on track and the whole time the va was telling her variations on "he is not in our system so we don't have him", "he must have checked himself out of the hospital", "have you checked the morgue", etc.

[Lord Humungus]

jeesuz. I would be in an apocalyptic rage if I was your mother.

[hamilton]

good lord.

[tarran]

My god! Just think what would have happened to the guy if he had been left in the clutches of the heartless free-market!

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

I would be looking for the tanned hide of a hospital administrator to add to my collection.

[JW]

Nah, you have to peoperly mount the head, otherwise people will think you bought the tanned hide on eBay.

[Will4Freedom]

I had 2 hernia operations courteously of the VA. I guess when I'm so old I'll consider suicide, I'll back again for healthcare.

[Episiarch]

Let's see...we can look to Canada or the UK for government run health care, and it's a disaster. We can look to our own VA, and it's an even worse disaster.

Yet the politicians rammed through the ACA anyway. Something tells me they don't give a fuck about examples of how this shit works in the real world. Imagine that. That's why they're TOP MEN.

[tarran]

That shit works just fine in the real world!

They get sick; they get treated at our expense at Walter Reed!

See the system works!

[Rich]

On a lightyear, uh, *lighter* note:

Nasa shows off prototype spacesuit for journey to Mars -- and Beyond!

[WTF]

Mars? Seems a little ambitious given that NASA can't even get an astronaut into earth orbit these days.

[Rasilio]

Yeah but in 2 - 3 yeahs they'll be able to buy a lift from Elon Musk and a couple of years after that Orbital Sciences will be in the game too

[Bardas Phocas]

My VA story.
I'm not a veteran, but a neighbor is. A working class guy who, in middle age, finds jesus and starts volunteering at the local VA since he figures he'll end up there eventually. After a few months of going up there 2-4 days a week he slowly transitioned into being a patient advocate.

Then he comes to me, begging for my help as he was ill-equiped to handle bureacracy and medicine and government. So I found myself dragged into trying to help old vets with dementia or disintegrating bodies. The clarifying point was when I was trying to confirm that a guy was getting his diabetes meds on time/daily, a nurse supervisor confronted me with the classic "Why do you care?"

Becuase you don't bitch.

[WTF]

"Why do you care?"

Corollary to "Fuck you, that's why".

[flye]

Wow. Just... wow. Kudos to you for getting involved.

[Scruffy Nerfherder]

My hat is off to you.

[Grand Moff Serious Man]

Yep, they fucked up with my late grandfather's case as well. Spent his final years in a nursing home the VA said it couldn't cover, so my uncle had to to basically empty his parents' bank account to pay for it.

And then last year they admitted they made a mistake and everything should have been covered under his benefits earned as marine and Korean War vet. Now my uncle, as executor of the estate, has to wait for them to reimburse the $300K they should have paid out. Which is naturally going to take years.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

What are the odds they never pay up? 94%?

[Anonymous Coward]

More than 1.5 million medical orders were canceled by the Department of Veterans Affairs without any guarantee the patients received the treatment or tests they needed, the Washington Examiner has found.

So...death panels?

[flye]

This seems more like those stories of USPS employees who deal with backlogs by tossing bags of mail into the trash. Except in this case they are failing to deliver something critically important.

[GILMORE]

Please watch

"The Wizard of VA" - by RangerUp

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7QH5LcmfyLI

[Free Society]

The government is not an institution predicated on delivery of services and thus fails at that task on all fronts. It's only service is violence, and even then it imposes a monopoly of unjust violence. It fails at every service it claims to deliver from enforcement of rights and contracts to welfare.

I hope one day Mr Gillespie, that you'll come around to the idea that even the military is just another political bureaucracy, except that it operates the guns. Their mission and their abilities are not sacrosanct exceptions to the rule that political institutions financed by theft, breed injustice and inefficiency.

[BiMonSciFiCon]

"I hope one day Mr Gillespie, that you'll come around to the idea that even the military is just another political bureaucracy, except that it operates the guns."

I bet Nick would agree with this. The Jacket wouldn't, but Nick would.

[Free Society]

So it's The Jacket that's imprisoned his intellect within the confines of statism. I know now what I must do...

[briny]

Nice to know why some consults just didn't happen.

[Captain Kirk]

Maybe they were doctors appointments that the troops didn't show up to?