VA benefits and care is really bad though to be fair. Some veterans really go through the meat grinder and are never put back together again.
The US’ policy is basically support the troops (in words only) and throw away the veterans (in actions). Thankfully Jon Stewart has really has put so much energy and real effort into VA care advocacy or it’d be worse. It’s still bad though.
Speaking as a veteran, the VA 100% earned that reputation - it used to be shit. They’ve improved a lot though. I get my care at the VA for everything that’s covered (which isn’t a lot, since I only have a couple things on my claim), and find that I pretty consistently get better care at the VA than any other local option. At civ hospitals, you’re just a cash cow. The VA’s infrastructure is still comically bad though… those elevators scare the hell out of me lol.
Speaking as a surgical tech, something most non-medical folks don’t realize is that most doctors (or at least most surgeons - I don’t get out of the operating room bubble very often) don’t work at just one hospital. They bounce around to wherever the cases are. A couple years ago I was scrubbed in with a surgeon who was laughing about how one of his patients at the VA hospital got all pissy about something and stormed out ranting about how he’s fed up with VA docs. Couple hours later, doc shows up to the civ hospital I worked at for his clinic hours there, and there’s Sergeant Dipshit sitting in the lobby waiting for a walk-in appointment to open up. Dude literally turned down completely free healthcare so that he could go get care from the exact same doctor; but now with a copay and insurance bullshit fighting against covering the care he needed in favor of a cheaper and less effective treatment.
All that said, I know every VA facility is kind of its own animal, so yours might just sincerely be shit; but if you haven’t been in a while and you have VA coverage, I’d encourage giving them another shot. Just don’t base your judgment on those sketchy fucking elevators.
That happens at my VA. Almost every doctor there rotates between the VA and the University hospital down the street. High quality professionals, garbage tier administration.
Speaking as a veteran, the VA 100% earned that reputation - it used to be shit. They’ve improved a lot though
The problem I have with this is that although the PACT Act may make it right in my case (we’ll see), I don’t really have any way to be diagnosed by the “improved VA” that I’m aware of. As I understand it from the letter I received previously, that I’m not able to appeal some shitty (in my opinion but I’m biased of course) findings.
sketchy fucking elevators.
lol funny you mention that. I thought my main VA was bad but then they contracted out some VA stuff more local to me and their elevators are even more sketchy! I actually take the stairs there, no joke. I just thought it was this VA and it was sort of a funny coincidence with the contracting practice’s office.
I honestly don’t blame the VA docs. They all seem pretty upfront and honest, even when it sucks but it seems like their hands are tied by the black and white.
Dude literally turned down completely free healthcare so that he could go get care from the exact same doctor; but now with a copay and insurance bullshit fighting against covering the care he needed in favor of a cheaper and less effective treatment.
It actually took someone convincing me to use the VA because I do have pretty good medical insurance for me and my family and I didn’t feel like I wanted to tie up the VA’s time and energy that could be spent on someone less fortunate. I have been discouraged for some time though because it just feels like a fight I don’t want when I can go just get it taken care of with my own insurance. So maybe I can see it from Sergeant Dipshit’s perspective without the details though the details are probably make a ridiculous choice he made. I can promise I’m not him though because I’ve never yelled at VA staff. I really don’t think they’re the problem. I don’t even think the VA itself is really the problem. I think legislators and perhaps specifically the VA oversight committee in the House.
I don’t really have any way to be diagnosed by the “improved VA” that I’m aware of.
Try to find a 3rd party place that specializes in VA claims. It varies a lot by wherever you live. They’ll go over the issues you want on your claim, send you to a doctor who knows how to write a DBQ, and help you compile them all into a claim.
If you do that, just make sure the place has a good reputation, and remember that whatever you claim is YOUR claim. There are some places that will help you literally BS your way to a 100% rating, but if you’re audited and its found that the things you claimed were fraudulent, it’s on YOU and not the people that helped you write it. Pretty sure that will land you in prison.
So… fluffing your claim to get them to recognize an issue you actually have: do what you need to do. Straight up lying about something that isn’t actually an issue; straight to jail.
I love, and do sencealy appreciate the enthusiasm, but being a vet myself, I’m curious if you have any specific, recent examples to note. My transition out and application for benefits was pretty painless. There was definitely a time when this was not the case (Korea, Vietnam, stuff before that probably), but I feel like the resources and aide are in a pretty good place right now. Anybody have any contradictory experiences?
There was a HUGE difference from when I first applied a few years after my first tour and had issues (around 2010) versus when I recently applied. The first time was a whole stack of paper only. Electronic wasn’t allowed. Must be in person to submit. If anything wasn’t filled out correctly they wouldn’t tell you, you just had to wait a month and get a letter telling you what page to resubmit. Then the appointments to evaluate you were scheduled with zero input from you. And occasionally they would do ghost bookings to boost numbers. Those are bookings where they would book it the day or two before, only give mail notice, and when you get it it was for an appointment that had now passed, and they make you rebook it with the strike against you for noshowing. It was a nightmare. Then the clinicians defaulted to just assuming you were there for money and if there was a shadow of doubt it was denied.
Then, if you did finally get a rating, good luck getting any treatment. I had a prescription of sertrilene, aka zoloft, literally the world’s most prescribed pill, it ran out after I moved back from Chicago to Houston. But because records were only regional at the time and I was in a new region, I had to re-register for Healthcare. And even though I had the bottle with me, I could not use the pharmacy without a new prescription. So I had to go through the ER, as a triage level 0. I was in there at 11 am and waited ALL DAY until the standard ER closing time and they shifted to life threatening only (about 6 pm), and was not seen. Told to come back the next day. Was in there by 10, seen around 3 or 4. And the doc who saw me was shocked about the whole thing when i explained it to him.
With all that, it has come a long way and was so much easier when I did a pact act claim. It was all online, simplified, they worked with me, contracted out the appointments, it was great. World of change over the last 10+ years.
Only gripes I have with the VA is their infrastructure is comically bad, parking capacity is about half what it needs to be, and the food in the cafeteria is apparently set at a price point geared toward milking their own doctors… my one and only time in the VA cafeteria, I did a lap around the different food stalls to find an affordable lunch… and eventually decided fuck it - I’ll just stay hungry.
As far as the actual healthcare I’ve gotten there; no complaints at all.
Pre recent PACT Act that Mr. Stewart shamed a certain party into finally getting on board with and passing, certain VA claims were difficult to get compensation or treatment for because there was no linking evidence to make it ‘service connected’. You couldn’t, for example, prove that the respiratory issues you have now was from huffing burning oil and other chemicals because you had no idea what chemicals you were ingesting and you didn’t complain about it 20 years ago when you were still in. The primary catalyst behind the PACT Act that just passed a few months back is because Veterans were dying due to obvious military connected issues but simply had zero way to prove it. You can’t just write a letter to some organization and be like “What was I exposed to while operating at FOB X, Y and Z. Also did you guys figure out if this could have caused this lung cancer I’m dying from?”
Or maybe for my predecessors “In the Gulf War I was on P-Tabs (pyridostigmine bromide if you don’t know) every day for months. Do you think this has lead to my issues?” because even though the VA’s Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses did in-fact find that it does and presented it along with other studies reinforcing this to the NAC (Gulf War and Health: Volume 8: Update of Health Effects of Serving in the Gulf War, 2010), in Chapter 8 they said
Although the Update committee did not assess the biological plausibility of the link between PB and pesticides and Gulf War illness … A comprehensive assessment of all the evidence on PB and pesticides exposures in the Gulf War was beyond the Update committee’s formal scope of work. … the Update committee found that human epidemiologic evidence was not sufficient to establish a causative relationship between any specific drug, toxin, plume, or other agent, either alone or in combination, and Gulf War illness.
and therefore, the VA’s official stance is that although the VA itself found evidence that PB causes chronic multisymptom illness and presented all of it that
the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) … has determined that there is no basis to establish any new presumptions of service connection at this time for any of the diseases, illnesses, or health effects …
in what could be a punchline to a joke about how the VA can determine that there is a problem in its initial study but that after presenting this to the NAC that did not itself conduct a study, the NAC and therefore the VA has found that there is not a problem and the veterans effected are screwed. But it’s OK because everyone involved recommends that something in the ether (“the government” without attribution to an actual organization) should still monitor the situation.
I have my own shitty experiences that I don’t really want to go into. I feel like I’ve been one of the lucky ones that haven’t died painfully as an old man yelling at clouds…yet. And it’s funny because I know veterans that are rated at 90% disabled as a desk jockey and combat vets that are rated 0% and neither have any idea why they are so high or so low.
Thankfully, my deployment finally got listed on the burn pit registry last year after 20 years and the PACT Act is going to give me a second chance…maybe…we’ll see after my toxicology appointment one day I guess.
Ask a Vet still on Tricare after service what they have to do to get anything above Motrin to manage chronic pain. I am grateful that I do not have to rely on Tricare myself and also that I currently do not need to manage chronic pain above Motrin/Ibuprofen every so often.
VA benefits and care is really bad though to be fair. Some veterans really go through the meat grinder and are never put back together again.
The US’ policy is basically support the troops (in words only) and throw away the veterans (in actions). Thankfully Jon Stewart has really has put so much energy and real effort into VA care advocacy or it’d be worse. It’s still bad though.
Speaking as a veteran, the VA 100% earned that reputation - it used to be shit. They’ve improved a lot though. I get my care at the VA for everything that’s covered (which isn’t a lot, since I only have a couple things on my claim), and find that I pretty consistently get better care at the VA than any other local option. At civ hospitals, you’re just a cash cow. The VA’s infrastructure is still comically bad though… those elevators scare the hell out of me lol.
Speaking as a surgical tech, something most non-medical folks don’t realize is that most doctors (or at least most surgeons - I don’t get out of the operating room bubble very often) don’t work at just one hospital. They bounce around to wherever the cases are. A couple years ago I was scrubbed in with a surgeon who was laughing about how one of his patients at the VA hospital got all pissy about something and stormed out ranting about how he’s fed up with VA docs. Couple hours later, doc shows up to the civ hospital I worked at for his clinic hours there, and there’s Sergeant Dipshit sitting in the lobby waiting for a walk-in appointment to open up. Dude literally turned down completely free healthcare so that he could go get care from the exact same doctor; but now with a copay and insurance bullshit fighting against covering the care he needed in favor of a cheaper and less effective treatment.
All that said, I know every VA facility is kind of its own animal, so yours might just sincerely be shit; but if you haven’t been in a while and you have VA coverage, I’d encourage giving them another shot. Just don’t base your judgment on those sketchy fucking elevators.
That happens at my VA. Almost every doctor there rotates between the VA and the University hospital down the street. High quality professionals, garbage tier administration.
The problem I have with this is that although the PACT Act may make it right in my case (we’ll see), I don’t really have any way to be diagnosed by the “improved VA” that I’m aware of. As I understand it from the letter I received previously, that I’m not able to appeal some shitty (in my opinion but I’m biased of course) findings.
lol funny you mention that. I thought my main VA was bad but then they contracted out some VA stuff more local to me and their elevators are even more sketchy! I actually take the stairs there, no joke. I just thought it was this VA and it was sort of a funny coincidence with the contracting practice’s office.
I honestly don’t blame the VA docs. They all seem pretty upfront and honest, even when it sucks but it seems like their hands are tied by the black and white.
It actually took someone convincing me to use the VA because I do have pretty good medical insurance for me and my family and I didn’t feel like I wanted to tie up the VA’s time and energy that could be spent on someone less fortunate. I have been discouraged for some time though because it just feels like a fight I don’t want when I can go just get it taken care of with my own insurance. So maybe I can see it from Sergeant Dipshit’s perspective without the details though the details are probably make a ridiculous choice he made. I can promise I’m not him though because I’ve never yelled at VA staff. I really don’t think they’re the problem. I don’t even think the VA itself is really the problem. I think legislators and perhaps specifically the VA oversight committee in the House.
Try to find a 3rd party place that specializes in VA claims. It varies a lot by wherever you live. They’ll go over the issues you want on your claim, send you to a doctor who knows how to write a DBQ, and help you compile them all into a claim.
If you do that, just make sure the place has a good reputation, and remember that whatever you claim is YOUR claim. There are some places that will help you literally BS your way to a 100% rating, but if you’re audited and its found that the things you claimed were fraudulent, it’s on YOU and not the people that helped you write it. Pretty sure that will land you in prison.
So… fluffing your claim to get them to recognize an issue you actually have: do what you need to do. Straight up lying about something that isn’t actually an issue; straight to jail.
I love, and do sencealy appreciate the enthusiasm, but being a vet myself, I’m curious if you have any specific, recent examples to note. My transition out and application for benefits was pretty painless. There was definitely a time when this was not the case (Korea, Vietnam, stuff before that probably), but I feel like the resources and aide are in a pretty good place right now. Anybody have any contradictory experiences?
There was a HUGE difference from when I first applied a few years after my first tour and had issues (around 2010) versus when I recently applied. The first time was a whole stack of paper only. Electronic wasn’t allowed. Must be in person to submit. If anything wasn’t filled out correctly they wouldn’t tell you, you just had to wait a month and get a letter telling you what page to resubmit. Then the appointments to evaluate you were scheduled with zero input from you. And occasionally they would do ghost bookings to boost numbers. Those are bookings where they would book it the day or two before, only give mail notice, and when you get it it was for an appointment that had now passed, and they make you rebook it with the strike against you for noshowing. It was a nightmare. Then the clinicians defaulted to just assuming you were there for money and if there was a shadow of doubt it was denied.
Then, if you did finally get a rating, good luck getting any treatment. I had a prescription of sertrilene, aka zoloft, literally the world’s most prescribed pill, it ran out after I moved back from Chicago to Houston. But because records were only regional at the time and I was in a new region, I had to re-register for Healthcare. And even though I had the bottle with me, I could not use the pharmacy without a new prescription. So I had to go through the ER, as a triage level 0. I was in there at 11 am and waited ALL DAY until the standard ER closing time and they shifted to life threatening only (about 6 pm), and was not seen. Told to come back the next day. Was in there by 10, seen around 3 or 4. And the doc who saw me was shocked about the whole thing when i explained it to him.
With all that, it has come a long way and was so much easier when I did a pact act claim. It was all online, simplified, they worked with me, contracted out the appointments, it was great. World of change over the last 10+ years.
Only gripes I have with the VA is their infrastructure is comically bad, parking capacity is about half what it needs to be, and the food in the cafeteria is apparently set at a price point geared toward milking their own doctors… my one and only time in the VA cafeteria, I did a lap around the different food stalls to find an affordable lunch… and eventually decided fuck it - I’ll just stay hungry.
As far as the actual healthcare I’ve gotten there; no complaints at all.
Pre recent PACT Act that Mr. Stewart shamed a certain party into finally getting on board with and passing, certain VA claims were difficult to get compensation or treatment for because there was no linking evidence to make it ‘service connected’. You couldn’t, for example, prove that the respiratory issues you have now was from huffing burning oil and other chemicals because you had no idea what chemicals you were ingesting and you didn’t complain about it 20 years ago when you were still in. The primary catalyst behind the PACT Act that just passed a few months back is because Veterans were dying due to obvious military connected issues but simply had zero way to prove it. You can’t just write a letter to some organization and be like “What was I exposed to while operating at FOB X, Y and Z. Also did you guys figure out if this could have caused this lung cancer I’m dying from?”
Or maybe for my predecessors “In the Gulf War I was on P-Tabs (pyridostigmine bromide if you don’t know) every day for months. Do you think this has lead to my issues?” because even though the VA’s Research Advisory Committee on Gulf War Veterans’ Illnesses did in-fact find that it does and presented it along with other studies reinforcing this to the NAC (Gulf War and Health: Volume 8: Update of Health Effects of Serving in the Gulf War, 2010), in Chapter 8 they said
and therefore, the VA’s official stance is that although the VA itself found evidence that PB causes chronic multisymptom illness and presented all of it that
(see this Federal Register notice)
in what could be a punchline to a joke about how the VA can determine that there is a problem in its initial study but that after presenting this to the NAC that did not itself conduct a study, the NAC and therefore the VA has found that there is not a problem and the veterans effected are screwed. But it’s OK because everyone involved recommends that something in the ether (“the government” without attribution to an actual organization) should still monitor the situation.
I have my own shitty experiences that I don’t really want to go into. I feel like I’ve been one of the lucky ones that haven’t died painfully as an old man yelling at clouds…yet. And it’s funny because I know veterans that are rated at 90% disabled as a desk jockey and combat vets that are rated 0% and neither have any idea why they are so high or so low.
Thankfully, my deployment finally got listed on the burn pit registry last year after 20 years and the PACT Act is going to give me a second chance…maybe…we’ll see after my toxicology appointment one day I guess.
Ask a Vet still on Tricare after service what they have to do to get anything above Motrin to manage chronic pain. I am grateful that I do not have to rely on Tricare myself and also that I currently do not need to manage chronic pain above Motrin/Ibuprofen every so often.