Category: Veteran Health Care

The Department of Veterans Affairs has published their new regulations for the Family Caregivers Program. They claim that it expands the program to include more family members who care for their wounded warriors. The link above takes you to a .pdf copy of the new reg in title 38, part 71 of the Code of Federal Regulations which is added and becomes effective today as it’s published in the Federal Register.

The Army Times encourages folks to apply for the benefit “ASAP”;

The Veterans Affairs Department will start accepting applications on Monday for a new, landmark benefits program for the caregivers of severely disabled Iraq- and Afghanistan-era veterans.

Full benefits, which will include living stipends, won’t be paid until July, but there is a good reason for caregivers to apply as soon as possible: Benefits will be retroactive to the date of application.

Applying for benefits is the first of many steps that will require working with caregiver coordinators at VA hospitals, getting the extent of the veteran’s disability assessed by VA doctors, and receiving rudimentary medical training in order to be certified as a caregiver. But for those who qualify, the program promises to improve the quality of life for both the disabled veterans, who will be able to stay at home rather than in a hospital or nursing home, and for caregivers, who often feel overburdened and unprepared to provide lifetime care.

Given the problems that the DVA has had rolling out this program, I’d advise people to apply now, too. The regs were supposed to published in January and here it is May already – but in my opinion, this is decades late. Anything to keep the troops in the arms of their families will be worth the effort this will inevitably require.

As you probably read here at TAH, here and here, that incompetent boob, Eric Shinseki, currently sucking the American tax payers dry by demonstrating the Peter Principle as the Secretary of Veterans Affairs, has failed to implement the DVA program meant to help wounded veterans out of long term care facilities and back into their homes.

The Wounded Warrior Project sent this message to you TAH fans this afternoon;

Wounded Warrior Project calls on Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the White House to make good on promised benefits.

Caregivers of veterans recovering from Traumatic Brain Injuries (TBI) at risk for being left out of Congressionally mandated benefits by VA

Jacksonville, FL (March 7, 2011) As we enter Brain Injury Awareness Month, the Wounded Warrior Project (WWP) is committed to ensuring that veterans injured during Operation Enduring Freedom and Operation Iraqi Freedom and their caregivers receive the benefits included in the Caregivers and Veterans Omnibus Health Services Act signed into law last year by President Obama.

“In 2010, Congress put assistance in place to ensure that the caregivers of these brave men and women are able to continue providing the necessary support for their recovery,” said Steve Nardizzi, Executive Director of WWP. “Nearly a year later and ironically coinciding with Brain Injury Awareness Month, family caregivers of as many as 2,500 severely brain-injured warriors may now be ineligible to receive benefits promised under a plan the VA continues to defend.”

“Last month, the VA submitted a plan that would shrink the number of families qualifying for benefits by more than three-quarters, hitting those with cognitive and related brain-injury impairments hardest,” Nardizzi continued. “It is unacceptable for the Administration to deviate so dramatically from the clear direction Congress set, and jeopardize the care of these service members to meet a new agenda.”

TBI has emerged as one of the signature wounds of the conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan. As a result, amazing strides have been made in the medical intervention and treatment of TBI. But with that comes a long road of treatment and care for these veterans when they return home. It’s a labor of love for the family caregivers of these severely wounded warriors, but also an all-consuming one in which many families have had to commit all of their resources to their loved one’s recovery process.

In providing for caregiver assistance, Congress clearly specified that the law covers caregivers of veterans who sustained traumatic brain injury in the line of duty and who were “in need of personal care services because of…a need for supervision or protection based on symptoms or residuals of neurological or other impairment or injury.” It is apparent when reviewing the Act as a whole, that the rehabilitation of veterans with traumatic brain injury was an intended goal with respect to each of these provisions.

WWP is calling on the Administration and the VA to recognize the severity and complexity of these injuries and guarantee that these American heroes and their families are provided the best support and care possible.

Join the effort to secure what has been promised to the caregivers of our nation’s heroes:

* Visit us on Facebook
* Learn more

Operator Dan sent us this link from American Progress, the leftist thought-free tank, entitled “Restoring Tricare” and of course, it targets military retirees and veterans upon whose backs, these pitiful girlie men want to balance the national debt.

Congress and the American public are rightly wary of asking veterans, servicemen and women, and their families to shoulder increasing health care costs when so many service members are or have recently been engaged in operations in Iraq and Afghanistan.

It is important to note, however, that our recommendations would in no way affect active-duty service members, who would continue to receive health care at no cost.

Of course, that’s their shield; our recommendations don’t affect active duty military. Um, if I’m not mistaken, those people who are currently serve will eventually become retired and expect their government to fulfill the promise of healthcare. It’s not like we were born into this world as military retirees, we earned it.

…this paper recommends restoring the cost-sharing balance between military retirees and the American taxpayer, a balance which was established in 1995 and has since been allowed to deteriorate for no good reason.

Ya know what happened in 1995? For all of you young bucks who weren’t around then, military retirees were kicked off of DVA and Tricare at the age of 65 and tossed onto the heap of Medicare. So all of that lifetime healthcare you earned was just gone. That’s the “balance” these peckerwoods are describing.

In order to address this growing imbalance, we recommend the following steps:

* Gradually phase in increased fees for military retirees, including a tiered fee structure for working-age retirees

More class warfare…since you did your time, retired, tried to catch up with your peers in the job market and became successful, we’re going to charge you for your healthcare and break payments down to be commensurate with your wages.

Increase cost sharing to encourage responsible use of Tricare for Life benefits

You’ve been using your benefits irresponsibly. You spent twenty years never going on sick call unless you needed it (mostly because you couldn’t stand spending the morning surrounded by whiny privates) but now suddenly, you’re irresponsible. SO we’re going to make it so expensive, you still won’t use it.

Limit double coverage for high-income retirees and peg Tricare premiums to Medicare Part B costs

There it is. Medicare again. What easier way exists to “peg Tricare premiums to Medicare ” than just move military retires to Medicare at 65 years of age?

Yeah, yeah, I read your comments about we should be willing to “give up” what we earned in the greater sense of service to our country, blah, blah, blah. I used to agree with you, until I noticed in the 90s that only ones “sacrificing” were veterans and service members. the rest of the goofballs were standing in line with hands out, in some sort stupor created by a sense of entitlement.

Naw, fuck you. This isn’t a sense of entitlement, this is promises made and promises broken. When I see fat shits like Hallis Mailen laying around on his fat ass demanding more from government, I lose my sense of patriotic duty to give up the shit I earned.

This time, if they want to brag about how they “balanced the budget” let them do it without my happy participation. Go after the waste and abuse, but leave me alone.

Did I mention that my pension has dropped about $125 in the last two years? That didn’t happen under Clinton or Bush. How the fuck does the value of my service drop?

Thanks to Old Trooper for that last link.

I’m beginning to be ambiguous about Jim Webb, the Virginia Senator who snubbed President Bush in the White House four years ago. At least he’s decided to be on the side of veterans in recent years. The Pentagon has proposed to raise Tricare fees for the medical treatment which we were promised would be free while we were serving. Senator Webb has vowed to make the Pentagon keep their promise;

“As someone who grew up in the military and served in the military, I start from the presumption that lifetime health care for career military personnel is part of a moral contract between our government and those who have stepped forward to serve,” said Webb, who heads the personnel subcommittee for the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Webb’s comments came one day after Defense Secretary Robert Gates proposed raising annual enrollment fees for the military’s Tricare health coverage by about 13 percent for working-age military retirees.

Of course, the Pentagon wants to balance their budget on the backs of those of us who don’t work for them any more. If GM or Ford tried to do the same thing with their legacy costs, the Obama Labor Department and Congressional committees would tear them apart. If this was cutting waste and abuse, I’d be all for it, but this punishing veterans for believing the government.