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Yep. System is so broke. Needs to be privatized. Get those air breathers off the gov't dole.
Lol, no. No, no, and no. A large majority of the problems with the VA exists due to drives to privatize it. When the VA is allowed to work as intended, it is an incredibly well-run machine. It's a model that health care facilities around the world would love to emulate. Their performance has routinely been cited as the same or significantly better than private care. Despite the excellent standard of care, a lot of money is poured into the narrative that the VA is substandard and that it would work better privatized. There have been dozens of investigative reports done on this. Here's one good example to get you started.
Stop trying to privatize the VA. Stop closing down clinics. Stop repeating the false allegation that the system is broken. The system needs improvements (as all systems do). It is not broken. The VA is a model that health care providers seek to emulate...that is, when it's not at the mercy of partisan politics or dark money.
Lol, no. No, no, and no. A large majority of the problems with the VA exists due to drives to privatize it. When the VA is allowed to work as intended, it is an incredibly well-run machine. It's a model that health care facilities around the world would love to emulate. Their performance has routinely been cited as the same or significantly better than private care. Despite the excellent standard of care, a lot of money is poured into the narrative that the VA is substandard and that it would work better privatized. There have been dozens of investigative reports done on this. Here's one good example to get you started.
Stop trying to privatize the VA. Stop closing down clinics. Stop repeating the false allegation that the system is broken. The system needs improvements (as all systems do). It is not broken. The VA is a model that health care providers seek to emulate...that is, when it's not at the mercy of partisan politics or dark money.
Sincerely,
A disabled veteran
There are regions where the VA is suffering and the patients in those regions are suffering, but that is wholly because of political shenanigans in Congressional funding. It's all in Congress, and it's all about politics, which is why the VA has had fingers pointed at it for at least the 45 years I've been paying attention--and that covers both parties.
Trump has said he make it so our vets can go to their own doctors, not to a VA. I think this is the best course of action.
Who cares what Trump thinks. Next week he'll just say something different.
But many of us have been saying...for years...that there should be no veterans hospitals except those designed to treat conditions unique to war (which is how they first started), and that veterans should be able to go to any hospital and doctor under a Medicare-like plan.
Okay so I only know one person (that I can think of) who died because of the VA.
If you look on USAJobs (where the VA advertises their job openings) and do a search for Registered Nurse you'll come up with over 1400 job openings. Operating room nurses starting at $55-65K. Nurse Practitioners starting at $75K? Does that sound about right to you? I make more than that without a degree (okay a 2yr degree which has nothing to do with my job).
Did you see the earlier post about the substandard doc being hired as head of something at the VA?
I'm really happy that some vets are happy with the service they get. I'm a vet myself and have VA benefits.
My other half went to the VA and was told "do you want surgery now and the doc will just cut it out? Or do you want to wait 6 months for the sports doc who will actually try to save it?" really?
News flash: The government can't manage squat. It costs more, takes longer and is often lower quality.
I love how illegal immigrants get free care, meanwhile this guy who literally bled and risked his life for us gets the shaft. It's wrong on so many levels I don't even know where to start.
My husband has received top-knotch care for a serious illness in two different VA medical centers.
When he has had to use Veterans Choice to "go on the outside" for tests which his local VA was unable to do, it takes weeks, if not months, to get an appointment. He has never had a problem getting an appointment with the VA.
Someone mentioned the camaraderie among veterans being served at the same facility---this is something that I have noticed and is a source of emotional support.
My husband's rare illness was discovered by a VA physician's ordering a simple test as part of a yearly physical---a test which is no longer done routinely by most civilian physicians as it is not considered"cost effective" as few illnesses are found through this test. However, if you are one of the few, this is literally life-saving due to early detection.
I wish this thread were limited to those with direct experience with VA medicine. I suspect that many here are coming in with talking points channeled from a certain presidential candidate who doesn't have a clue what he is talking about.
Who cares what Trump thinks. Next week he'll just say something different.
But many of us have been saying...for years...that there should be no veterans hospitals except those designed to treat conditions unique to war (which is how they first started), and that veterans should be able to go to any hospital and doctor under a Medicare-like plan.
Not for conditions unique to war, but to conditions prevalent to war and greatly multiplied by war. One exception--they were also able to treat long-term morphine addition.
I love how illegal immigrants get free care, meanwhile this guy who literally bled and risked his life for us gets the shaft. It's wrong on so many levels I don't even know where to start.
Being on a supply ship in peacetime, he probably didn't "literally bleed and risk his life for us."
Not all servicemen serve active war duty putting their lives on the line. A vet is a personnel who served in military.. no more no less. So my bros are vets and never put their lives on the line...they did have some nasty mess hall food. But nah...their officer status kept them at a desk
The concern is procedure. The corporate owned hospitals charge outrageously. To have VA hospitals keeps cost in check so that the millions served...are served.
If you and millions others are okay with another tax hike to cover Corp hospitals that charge 4$ to dispense aspirin then let it be the consensus. I for one narrow down where the system is needing adjusted.
I have trouble believing that.
First off, "so that the millions served...are served", except there are all too many cases where they are not being served. So your premise is out the window at the very beginning.
Second, to have a modern VA hospital -- I think we want our vets to have modern health care -- requires modern facilities and modern equipment. The plant is extremely expensive.
Third, many vets don't live near a VA hospital.
Fourth, aside from the plant itself, medical equipment is rapidly developing. I doubt the VA can keep up with the need for the newer, most modern equipment. Instead, I believe there is a tendency to get by with the old equipment, even though that may not best serve the patient.
I say all this with no axe to grind. My father spent his last days in a VA hospital where I felt they did an excellent job and that they were very caring. But honestly, even though it was in the late 1980s, when I visited I had this feeling I was back in the immediately post-war era...which is exactly when that VA hospital was built.
I'm not convinced he was a VA patient. The VA has completely automated their records. Every VA facility has network access to every patient's record anywhere. The story says he was on daily medication--if he were a patient, the ER would have been able to check his records immediately and see what his situation was--and probably would have dealt with him in some way.
The confusion was probably a matter of having no record of him in the system.
You can have the best patient tracking software but it's worthless if your employees are lazy jerks who want a paycheck without doing any work to earn that paycheck.
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