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GAO TO LOOK AT SOLDIERS' BRAIN INJURIES -- The
investigative arm of Congress will send a team
to Fort
Carson to examine mental health care for Iraq
war
veterans after complaints that some soldiers
with brain damage have been misdiagnosed.
Story here...
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/
national/1110AP_Soldiers_Brain_Damage.html
Story below:
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GAO to look at soldiers' brain injuries
By ROBERT WELLER
ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER
DENVER -- The investigative arm of Congress said Friday it will send a
team to Fort Carson to examine mental health care for Iraq war veterans
after complaints that some soldiers with brain damage have been
misdiagnosed.
Fort Carson, near Colorado Springs, has come under close scrutiny amid
rising national concern about the Army's treatment of Iraq veterans with
brain injuries and mental health problems.
Marcia Crosse, health care director for the Government Accountability
Office, told The Associated Press that the team will visit soon, but no
date had been set.
"We welcome all visits to look into the systems," Dee McNutt, a
spokeswoman for Fort Carson, said Friday.
The advocacy group Veterans for America has said it is looking into as
many as 40 cases where Fort Carson soldiers with brain damage or
stress-related injuries may have been misdiagnosed with personality
disorders. The GAO is aware of those cases, Crosse said, but the visit
will look at systemwide mental health issues.
"We can show them cases where Army rules have been violated. And this is
just a beginning. We know of cases elsewhere," said Stephen Robinson,
director of veterans affairs for the advocacy group.
Fort Carson released a study last month that found that nearly 2,400 of
the 13,400 troops it had sent to Iraq, or 18 percent, suffered at least
some brain damage from insurgents' explosive devices.
The report also said 276 soldiers at Fort Carson have been discharged
since 2003 because of personality disorders, and 56 of them also had
post-traumatic stress disorder. An unspecified number of the soldiers
with PTSD had suffered traumatic brain injury, the report said.
It said none of the PTSD cases was serious, and therefore none of the
soldiers had been examined by a medical board before being discharged.
None of the 276 will receive disability pay or medical benefits.
Fort Carson is the first Army post to announce it will try using
brain-scan equipment to help detect brain injuries in soldiers returning
from Iraq. The equipment is not generally used in the Army, although a
congressional task force this week recommended that it be employed
throughout the service.
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On the Net:
Army medical guidelines:
https://www.hrc.army.mil/site/Active/TAGD/Pda/pdapage.htm
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Larry Scott --
