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VETERANS SAY THERE'S ROOM TO IMPROVE AT

MOUNTAIN HOME VA -- But, Chief of Staff speaks

of improvement and quality care.

 

Mountain Home VA

 

We have two stories.

First story here... http://www.timesnews.net/
article.php?id=3748772

Story below:

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Veterans: Room to improve at local VA

By REX BARBER

MOUNTAIN HOME - It took months of therapy for Joseph Davis to overcome the trauma of serving in Iraq.

"It was getting to the point while I was asleep in bed with my wife that I would get up while I was asleep and try to punch my wife and hold her down," he said.

That was his post-traumatic stress syndrome acting out, he said. Joseph remembers doing none of that. When he was told of his actions, the guilt was almost too much to bear.

Both he and his wife, Sarah, believe he would be dead today were it not for his treatment at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center at Mountain Home.

Still, for all the good the VA has done for Joseph, there is a large gap between the care provided and the care needed, the couple said.

Joseph and Sarah tried for a year to get him into a program for PTSD at the VA. Each time they were told the program was too full. He was finally placed in a three-month program, which has completely changed his demeanor.

"I tell you what, a pro for the VA is that program," Sarah said. "So I am thankful for the people that work in that program."

But Sarah said it took entirely too long to get Joseph into treatment.

"To me they have no sense of care and no sense of urgency to fix any problems," she said of the VA. "It's below par. You can't expect these guys coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan to be treated like this."

Joseph thought the VA was ill-equipped to handle the problems new veterans will have.

"And the VA hospital is not ready for the Iraqi veterans to come back," he said. "The mental problems" faced by veterans are just too great.

Several local veterans are speaking out about the need for improvements in communication, doctor attitudes and other issues associated with Mountain Home.

They also say there are good things about Mountain Home.

Jerry Campbell, chapter president of the Vietnam Veterans of America in Elizabethton, partakes of the VA's services.

"You hear a lot of griping about it, but it has gotten better. It has improved, but it's got a long way to go," he said.

"I really don't have anything bad to say," adding that he has had major surgery at the VA.

He said he received a staph infection once after surgery.

"By all rights I should have died," Campbell said. "I was in pretty bad shape but they pulled me through."

Kenneth Bass of Carter County served in the Air Force from December 1981 until 1992 and also receives medical treatment from the VA.

"Well, to be honest with you, compared to what it was 10 years ago it's fantastic," Bass said.

Bass suffered a heart attack three years ago this April 20.

"I haven't seen a cardiologist at the VA since my heart attack," he said. "The primary care I don't have any complaints with," but, he adds, the specialty clinics leave much to be desired.

"If you've got heart trouble and you're a veteran and you can't afford to go to a doctor, you're doomed," he said, citing his own situation. "You'll just die."

"Recovery care out there is pathetic," he said, referring to the VA. "And their coronary care as far as follow-up appointments like that is pathetic.

"Cardiology is a disaster, ER is a disaster. It just varies from clinic to clinic."

While he does have gripes about Mountain Home, he admitted there have been improvements, like the wait times in the emergency room.

"At that time the VA was a nightmare," he said, citing his first experiences with the VA emergency room in the early 1990s. "You could go over there with a cold and sit there for 10 or 11 hours. It's a whole lot better than it was 20 years ago and it could stand improvement in other (areas)."

VA patient Eugene Lewis from Hampton served in the infantry in Vietnam for 14 months and nine days during 1968-70.

"All in all I would rate their service as poor now, myself," Lewis said of the VA.

One of the biggest problems Lewis has with the VA is frequency of appointments.

He said when he first began visiting Mountain Home for health care he had appointments every three months. Soon he was only able to go twice a year. Now he is only allowed one visit every nine months, he said. He wondered if appointments would eventually be annual.

"If you've got something wrong with you, you can't go every nine months to see a doctor. My rheumatoid arthritis is absolutely destroying me."

Both Lewis and Joseph Davis have complaints about their doctors, saying they don't really listen.

"I'm not real happy with my doctor," Lewis said. "She doesn't seem to care. It seems like somebody, somewhere can change these things," he said.

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Second story here... http://www.timesnews.net/
article.php?id=3748745

Story below:

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Mountain Home leader lauds improvements at VA hospital

By REX BARBER

MOUNTAIN HOME - While veterans have a variety of complaints about the Veterans Affairs Medical Center at Mountain Home, the administration is quick to point out that the organization has improved dramatically over the years.

David Reagan, chief of staff for Mountain Home, said the VA system has improved during the past 15 years. Part of the reason for the positive changes cited by the VA is the partnership in 1999 with the Institute for Healthcare Improvement.

"We really began to look at, not so much individual episodes, but the system in which we provide health care," Reagan said. "The net result of that is that we're much more aware now."

He said those changes came about slowly, and the VA health care system as a whole is better now than it was years ago.

"Change is good," he said. "Change is difficult, but change really does lead to progress, and change is beneficial to our employees."

Reagan and others at Mountain Home wanted to separate the VA system from the Army system, which includes Walter Reed Army Medical Center.

Mountain Home employs just more than 1,400 staff, including 105 physicians and 450 nurses. The hospital accommodates 38,000 veteran patients from Oak Ridge to Western North Carolina and up into Southwest Virginia and parts of Kentucky.

"So in general terms we are the fourth- or fifth-largest employer in the region," Reagan said. "I really think it's a wonderful team environment here. Health care is really a team sport."

The nursing home offered at Mountain Home accommodates about 120 veterans. It has rehabilitation services and a long-term care service. But most patients, including homeless veterans, do not stay at the facility indefinitely.

One veteran mentioned in part one of this series received post-traumatic stress syndrome treatment while staying in the domiciliary. He, like others, complained about frequency of appointments, level of care and doctor attitudes.

Reagan said it would be the exception for patients to be seen once per year, as one veteran alleged.

"Health care is a service industry, and it's sort of an individual case," Reagan said. "And some people may need to be seen only once a year."

The VA keeps detailed statistics, and Reagan said most patients visit Mountain Home about six or seven times per year.

He also said the emergency room wait time is the best it has been in 10 years.

"Most days it takes less than one hour to see most patients," he said. "If you compare that to national statistics, that is much better than national statistics."

The frequency of visits is one aspect of the VA system that is well-documented.

"We are the most scrutinized health care system in the country, and our wait times are reported to Congress," Reagan said. "It is rare to have more than one or two of these clinics to have a wait time of more than 30 days for an appointment."

He said 96 percent to 98 percent of patients who schedule an appointment receive it within 30 days.

Many veterans rely on treatment at the VA because they cannot afford another health care provider. While the individual cost to a veteran patient will vary by appointment and service type, the average cost is $15 for a primary care visit and $50 for a specialty visit. There is no co-pay for service-connected disabled veterans.

"It's actually a great deal," Reagan said. "If a medicine costs $5 or $5,000, they pay the same amount."

For various reasons, veterans who receive care from the VA also receive care from the general health care system, and the VA doctors take that into account when prescribing medications and treatments.

"I think we can feel confident that 40 percent of veterans receive at least one visit with an outside health care provider," Reagan said. "It's a minority, but a significant minority. One of the reasons that it's so important to us is that it's important for us to know what medications they are on and what treatment they are receiving."

One of the ways the VA helps keep track of patient medications is through the largest electronic filing system in the country.

Part of that program is MyHealtheVet, a program that allows patients to order prescription refills online from their homes. The drugs are then shipped to the patient's house.

"It's a wonderful effort," said Reagan of the MyHealtheVet program. "Most of the funding has come locally from businesses and organizations."

Some veterans have complained of inadequate care in certain clinics at the VA.

Reagan said some veterans have to travel to other facilities for some surgeries, and that can cause problems, but for the most part the VA tries to minimize the hassles.

Reagan said the VA does not perform various procedures, including some dermatology procedures that must be contracted out to local clinics.

According to Reagan, the VA tries to accommodate the patient as best it can when surgeries or services must be performed off VA grounds.

"It's rare that we have difficulties," he said. "We try to look at where the patient is from, and if we can find something close to their home, we will do that."

Reagan said he would like to see the VA be able to grow in areas like rheumatology and orthopedics, and the facility is in the process of upgrading its radiation therapy.

"We're always wanting to grow," he said. "Our operating rooms are very busy, and it is possible we'll have to expand the number of rooms. So those are some of the things that I'm looking forward to."

Reagan said the hospital constantly works to improve patient experiences.

"What I'd have to say is we are in better shape right now than we were in other years," Reagan said. "The one thing you can say about the VA ... is there have been more constructive changes in the VA health care system than there has been in the entire national health care system."

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Larry Scott  --