GULF WAR VETERANS FROM 90-91 need HELP NOW!

by Denise Nichols, Staff Writer

Since my article on the Charleston AFB Gulf War Pilots and Flight Crews appeared, I am continuing to get emails on a steady basis of others who have died or are ill in the Medical Unit  at that base that served during Desert Storm.  There will be update Articles as I have the information.

We also want to take the time to provide an update on Matt Letterman’s case ie Desert Storm Diaries published here on VT.com.  Despite efforts that started when he met fellow veterans of Desert Storm in September 2008 on a trip to appear before the VA’s Gulf War Veterans’ Advisory Committee and his meeting there with VA Headquarters Claims people to include Keith Stabler and a partial attempt by Missouri Representative Jo Ann Emerson there is still no resolution to Mr Letterman’s VA Claim.  Representative Emerson’s staff seems to have dropped advocacy for their constituent.  Now Senator Bond’s staff has become involved this past week.

The veterans that have met Mr Letterman have gone through his records.  Mr Letterman never had a C and P exam throughout his claims process.  The DAV originally was his power of attorney and they certainly let that slip by them!

The fellow Gulf War Veterans have combined their skills to try and get a C and P exam done.  They have called VA headquarters and VA Personnel at LR VA.  They have written to Senator Bond asking for his help to get this accomplished ASAP to find out if this is the missing link that will finally help get this claim resolved. 

Last week Mr Letterman drove to Little Rock VA seeking help.  He had gone to his local VA Clinic and the Dr was on vacation.  Mr Letterman knew he needed help because now not only are his feet swollen from edema and pitting edema but his legs are both swollen so bad he can not even bend his knees. Seems that no one at the VA ER was that concerned with his legs.  He did receive care in the VA ER to rule out an MI/Chronic Heart Failure.  He received lab tests for that and nitroglycerin and an Xray.  Then they ruled that out and discharged him at 10:30 PM when they close the ER.  He stayed in the parking lot in his truck in 90 plus degree weather. 

The next morning he was back to try and get help, his legs still swollen and having to use a wheel chair because he could not breath well.  He ended up back in ER where he received Nitroglycerin and Lasix, no check on electrolyte balance was done and no one seemed concerned with the swelling in his legs or his abdomen that has been increasing each day.  He met with the patient representative who is helping him transfer his care to the VA Little Rock.  But still no C and P has been scheduled.  He was discharged from the ER again that day with still no resolution to his medical concerns.

Back in February or March the VA clinic doctor had identified some problem with Mr Letterman’s Spleen, it was enlarged. 

Mr Letterman’s Gulf War Veteran friends are doing all they can to get this veteran a C and P exam to see if that can help to finally get his claim complete and reviewed successfully.  Personnel at VA headquarters say that this could help. 

Our question is why is it taking so much effort to get Mr Letterman a C and P Exam after over two years?  His fellow veterans are deeply concerned that Mr Letterman’s case will not get the attention quickly.  Why the push?  Mr Letterman is now a single parent trying to taking care of his five children and it just isnt happening.

Despite being a veteran the paperwork at the VA Little Rock indicates he is not a combat veteran and that he is employed.  Both of these are wrong.  He is not employed.  He tries to supplement his SS with bushwracking jobs with his tractor but those jobs are scarce.  He has sold off his livestock through his battles the last couple of years to feed his family.  He is down to the bottom and needs help now!!!

Mr Letterman got SS in 5 days but VA well that still waits resolution.  Well I guess the VA and DC cann’t get it done.  Children are at risk here as well as the veteran.  In order to support those children Mr Letterman did not apply for Medicare so he can use a civilian medical system.  Why because he needed every cent to support his five children.

One Disabled Gulf War Veteran has already sent Mr Letterman money to help with the immediate need to pay electric bill and others are trying to see what they can do to help.

Mr Letterman is just one example of the thousands of gulf war veterans from 1990-91 still trying to get help!

Pay vets’ disability claims — now
By MARTIN SCHRAM
Scripps Howard News Service

July 20, 2009
Monday

Today we are proposing a solution for stimulating America’s slow-to-recover economy that can please Washington’s left, center and right.

And it has the added virtue of patriotically doing what is right for those who have already done so much for us all.

The U.S. economy has responded more slowly than many predicted to the Obama stimulus plan. Unemployment has soared to a 25-year high. For months we heard about stimulus projects that were "shovel-ready." Now we know what the politicians were shoveling.

Today many experts say a second round of stimulus will be needed. Yet Republicans who opposed the first stimulus as too costly and too porky still prefer to do it with tax cuts. Perhaps we can do the job without more shovels or more tax cuts.

On July 13, The New York Times published a report by James Dao of front-page significance (never mind that it was way back on page A-10): The Department of Veterans Affairs’ perpetual backlog of unprocessed claims of military veterans has soared to a high of 400,000. Six years ago, the VA’s backlog of 253,000 was considered unacceptable.

The VA says it has reduced the average delay in processing claims to less than half a year. But that figure doesn’t take into account the ordeal the VA imposes upon veterans once the processing begins.

Shamefully, VA adjudicators often adopt an adversarial mindset toward veterans. They challenge thousands of veterans’ claims in ways that are mindless and disrespectful, a sad truth I discovered in researching my 2008 book, "Vets Under Siege: How America Deceives and Dishonors Those who Fight Our Battles."

Inexperienced VA adjudicators routinely challenge and deny veterans’ claims of combat-related disabilities. Example: Army military policeman Eric Adams, of Tampa, led a truck convoy in Iraq, when a roadside bomb exploded in front of his van and a tractor-trailer smashed into him from the rear. First, the VA adjudicator said he hadn’t been in combat because he was just an MP. Later, an adjudicator ruled he didn’t have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, even though two VA doctors had diagnosed it.

The VA unconscionably drags out cases for years and even decades. Denials are often appealed, overturned, but remanded back to the original adjudicator, who finds new grounds for another denial. Yet in the end almost 90 percent of the claims are eventually approved. In the end, Harvard Professor Linda Bilmes has noted, the result is not unlike the way the Internal Revenue Service handles most tax refunds. The IRS pays refunds to most and just reviews a small percentage of the tax returns. Why can’t the VA do something similar?

Here’s how we can stimulate the economy: Pay our military veterans the benefits we owe them — right now! We can treat VA benefits claims like IRS tax returns. Select a sampling, perhaps 10 percent to 25 percent, to be reviewed — and immediately pay the claims of the rest.

"That’s a great idea — let’s do it," said House Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman Bob Filner, D-Calif. "I endorse it completely."

He said Vietnam War veterans are still being challenged for disability claims due to exposure to the defoliant Agent Orange — stop challenging and start paying. And veterans from the Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan who were in war zones must be presumed to have been in combat.

Filner, whose committee has become Washington’s most active advocate for VA reforms, suggested another way of accomplishing the same goal. "Let the VA send a check — immediately — for a 30-percent disability to every veteran who filed a claim." Presume that minimum disability level and pay it now. Then the VA can review claims for greater disability. Once they are proven, pay the veterans the rest of what they deserve.

Pay the veterans and they will quickly shovel it back into the economy — like tax cuts. Except we will be repaying men and women who truly need and merit the money, unlike tax cuts given to folks because they have off-shore tax shelters.

For too long, we have inflicted unconscionable delays and injustices upon men and women who fought our battles. Now they are shovel-ready — and willing to serve us again.

Martin Schram writes political analysis for Scripps Howard News Service.