Bridging The DOD-VA Gap

Brian McGough knows the pain of navigating from Department of Defense (DOD) medical care to Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) care all too well.

In October 2003, Brian was wounded by a roadside bomb on the outskirts of Mosul. After undergoing surgery to repair his open head wound, he spent several months recovering at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Brian still battles the effects of both his injuries.

But Brian's battle wasn't over when he left the military.

The gaps in transitioning from DOD to VA care were so bad, the byzantine process so confusing, and the paperwork so heavy, that Brian had to spend three months on unemployment, while he waited to be fully transitioned, so he could receive benefits from the VA for his injuries, which made it impossible to work at the time.

Thankfully, Brian's doing better today, and is now the Legislative Director and Vice Chairman of VoteVets.org. As the group's point person on policy, Brian made sure that making a seamless transition from DOD to VA was one of our legislative priorities.

So when the White House called and asked VoteVets to be there today, to hear the president announce a huge initiative to bridge the transitioning gap from DOD to VA care, who do you think we gave the honors?

The announcement from the President that DOD and the VA will create a Joint Virtual Lifetime Electronic Record for all those who serve our nation in uniform will change the way we treat our troops and veterans, for the better, permanently. By doing away with all the paper and moving to electronic records, all pertinent information will follow a servicemember through his or her service, to return, and then to transition to VA care and beyond. Not only does this mean fewer mistakes in diagnosis and treatment, but that a lot of the maze of bureaucracy and paperwork that kept Brian from getting the care and benefits he needed will disappear.

That, along with the president's support for advance funding for the Department of Veterans Affairs, and opening the department up to many vets who were previously shut out because of their incomes, will help ensure generations to come can get better care with fewer headaches.

And that's the point. Because, the truth is, this is bigger than me, bigger than Brian, and bigger than VoteVets.org. This is about the thousands upon thousands of veterans who are still struggling with this transition, and the millions of troops who will face this transition for many, many years to come.

Though today's announcement was an extremely positive deal, not every problem was fixed today, and we still have a lot of work to do. But, as long as the White House reaches out to us, we'll be there to work with them.

Crossposted at VetVoice.com

Comments

[eilish]

09:03 PM on 04/09/2009

Having spent the better part of 2008 fighting for benefits for my son, I can understand some of Brian's pain - and especially the confusion. Since he had already been discharged, unemployment from his job was denied him when he could no longer work due to combat injury. He and his family, including a toddler, had no home for 5 months. We all literally lived in a room at the VA hospital, where several organizations fed us, provided us with a car, and even some Angel flights so we could go back to Anchorage and put everything into storage. After the first few weeks of insane attempts to meet VA paperwork requirements I was advocating for some continuity and electronic records. My son's VA records have gone missing again, resulting in denial for SSD benefits.

[cariintexas]

05:35 PM on 04/09/2009

Saw your interview on MSNBC. Thanks Brian for sharing your story. Everytime we feel we have heard all the horror stories about what has and is happening to our bravest and best, there's something else brought to light. Thanks to all of you at Votevets for the tremendous work you're doing. We need to keep contacting members of congress who will listen and get them in behind you and our President.

[HawkeyeD]

04:33 PM on 04/09/2009

Hooah, Brian! Thanks, Jon.

Some people pay lip service to honor veterans, your work honors us all.

[PlaceboStudman]

12:55 PM on 04/09/2009

As much as veterans who serve our country deserve all of this wonderful treatment, I am still forced to ask, and will continue to ask until I get a legitimate non flaming response to why one needs to sacrifice life and limb, literally, to have our concerns addressed? And why is it more beneficial to be uninsured in this country, than it is to be insured, and living with the knowledge that I will die, not because I am disabled, but because the medicines and treatments that I receive because I am disabled are killing me? What of those of us who would love to have served our country and benefitted from the services our military receive, but who were denied because we were born, through no fault of our own, with a congenital birth defect that costs tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to treat over 30-40-60 years?

[sunny123]

12:43 PM on 04/09/2009

Good news! Keep up your great work for our veterans. They have earned a better way.

[demfriend]

12:38 PM on 04/09/2009

While working with the military in-patient you cannot believe the mess the having to work with paper patient records. They get lost more times than people realize because not only do they follow to duty stations/bases they follow when in-patient and then hopefully the record makes it back to where the service member is really stationed. If a patient is medivac'd then the real duty station can be anywhere and the base assigned to can be anywhere so the records might reach us, might not. They might find the patient might not. The service member might be told we have the record still because a doctor might have the record still, or maybe the record was sent on and we were the last on the list who signed for it. Just having this piece of the mess says much about the system so broken down at the basic level for active duty, how bad can it be for the VA piece? Much worse. It is a nightmare from those I have dealt with.

[alicarn]

11:28 AM on 04/09/2009

This is good news for all of our servicemen and women. Keep up the good work!