Gen. Shinseki: Here's the way VA really works from a veteran’s point of view.

[babylonsister]

Gen. Shinseki: Here's the way VA really works from a veteran’s point of view.
by llbear
Wed Feb 11, 2009 at 05:29:27 PM PST



Dear Secretary General Shinseki ,
Deputy Secretaries Tammy Duckworth and Scott Gould:

Here is a bottom-up look at the Veterans Administration. I'm a routine patient with no unusual medical problems. I love and respect my VA doctors, nurses, technicians and clerks - most of the time. I had 10 years of care as a Chicago-based patient, and for the last 10 years, as a "rural-based" patient.

This is not a litany of all that is wrong at VA. That would be a series too daunting for even jimstaro, testvet, or any of the other diary writers who focus on veteran’s issues – there is simply too much that is wrong. Instead, I am going to provide some basic background information about the VA that regular readers of Daily Kos might not know, and relate my personal experience about just one average appointment at the Veterans Administration.


BACKGROUND & HISTORY:

Harry Truman did it right. So can Barack Obama. Back in 1945 Harry decided that the Veterans Administration needed to be totally made over. World War II veterans were about to sink the existing organization with demands for health care.

On August 15, 1945, President Harry Truman appointed General Omar Bradley to direct the Veterans Administration (VA). Almost immediately Bradley set out to modernize and restructure the organization. Under his leadership VA hospitals were built where they could provide the most benefit to the most veterans, rather than where politicians wanted them located. Medical care at those hospitals was greatly improved as well. Bradley revised and extended the educational benefits of the G.I. Bill, arranged for jobs and job training programs for veterans, established a program of loans for veterans, and administered a massive growth in veterans insurance and disability pensions. He remained at the helm of the VA until December 1947.



General Bradley created an all-new Veterans Administration in two years BC {Before Computers} 65 years ago. General Eric Shenseki, the new Secretary of Veterans Affairs, is facing many of the same problems Bradley faced and I'm going to show you only part of those problems - the Veterans Healthcare Administration.

more...

http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/2/11/202927/936/278/688233