Soldiers Face Neglect, Frustration At Army's Top Medical Facility

Colleges and Universities A-Z Naval Academy - Annapolis
1

<p>"It looks like the masses of poor, underprivileged, patriotic soldiers we use to fight our wars will continue to receive treatment on par with what Medicare patients get, or worse.</p>

<p>Military medicine is truly an abomination that needs massive and immediate change.....that's why it will not happen."</p>

<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/17/AR2007021701172.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/17/AR2007021701172.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>Instead of reform, military medicine has gone downhill since 1998's Pulitzer's work pleading for change.
<a href="http://www.pulitzer.org/year/1998/national-reporting/works/index.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.pulitzer.org/year/1998/national-reporting/works/index.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>"Our admin/beauracracy only know one thing- how to protect their jobs- not how to do a strong job that serves the average member."</p>

<p>"just how many threads, just how many personal accounts from on the job physicians, just how many newspaper articles, poor patient outcomes, doctors separating etc. will it take until somebody with some big enough clout in Washington gets a big enough clue that something stinks in milmed and its time to sweep the crap out the door and do the right thing???????"</p>

<p>*As Walter Reed services many Marines and Army personnel, I've posted this in both the USMA and USNA forums.</p>

2

<p>My heart goes out to our servicemen.</p>

3

<p>From Harvard Medical School:</p>

<p><a href="http://web.med.harvard.edu/sites/REL..._11Landon.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://web.med.harvard.edu/sites/REL..._11Landon.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>"BOSTON-December 11, 2006 - Patients are more likely to receive high quality of care in not-for-profit hospitals and in hospitals with more registered nurses and advanced technology, reports a comprehensive Harvard Medical School (HMS) analysis published in the Dec. 11 Archives of Internal Medicine."</p>

<p>"Not-for-profit hospitals consistently performed better than for-profit hospitals for each condition, and federal and military hospitals had the highest performance."</p>

<p>By they way, they treat servicemen and servicewomen.</p>

4

<p>SAME POST IN THE WP FORUM........Read my response there</p>

5

<p>Published in today's Washington Compost:</p>

<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/18/AR2007021801335.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/18/AR2007021801335.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>
[quote]
The guests of Mologne House have been blown up, shot, crushed and shaken, and now their convalescence takes place among the chandeliers and wingback chairs of the 200-room hotel on the grounds of Walter Reed Army Medical Center.</p>

<p>Oil paintings hang in the lobby of this strange outpost in the war on terrorism, where combat's urgency has been replaced by a trickling fountain in the garden courtyard. The maimed and the newly legless sit in wheelchairs next to a pond, watching goldfish turn lazily through the water....

[/quote]
</p>

6

<p>This weekend, at a USNAPC meeting, parent of USNA'98 says son, who holds both Purple Heart and Bronze Star, received NOTHING BUT THE BEST medical treatment possible when wounded on third tour in Iraq. Still serving. Still a line officer. Likely reupping. hmmmm. I will take it from the horse's mouth, rather than rely on the Washington Post.
(where is Las Pulperias?? Honduras??)</p>

7

<p>I only read the first page of the article and couldn't read much past the black mold, mouse droppings, and belly up cockroaches.</p>

<p>I don't know about mil. facilities, but in the civilian sector, we MUST pass Joint Commission of Accreditation of Hospitals. Anything to the contrary is unacceptable and we get NO patients. </p>

<p>I am REALLY not trying to stick my head in the sand, and hope it's not true. If it is, my heart is breaking.</p>

<p>They all deserve top of the line. :(</p>

8

<p>I just have to say that those issues (physical environment) don't exist at Bethesda. It's a new building to be sure, but I think the up keep has been better.</p>

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<p>I should say 'newer' building</p>

10

<p>I don't usually post during the week; usually busy trying to make a living. This is a good example, however, of the public getting ramped up over a posting that does not accurately present a story. [I was wondering where those quotes came from myself.]</p>

<p>It is important to note that this is a story about ONE building in the Walter Reed complex. While there may be other facilities also straining under the pressure of increased use, Building 18 [as stated in the story and as widely reported in the media over the weekend] is the one suffering from mold, etc. This is a building used to house out-patient soldiers still under care at WR. The HOSPITAL is still considered a first-class facility.</p>

<p>Despite the naysayers [who frequently cannot support their assertions with any fact], military facilities are considered "top of the line." In addition, VA treatment facilities and care are now considered some of the finest care available by independent rating agencies. [How about that for socialized medicine?]</p>

<p>While there may be individual problems [Building 18] that should be fixed, overall, the provision of health care to members of the military is good [excellent?].</p>

<p>But, I am sure this is just another example of the liberal media bashing the military. Right?</p>

11

<p>nurseypoo:

[quote]
...I don't know about mil. facilities, but in the civilian sector, we MUST pass Joint Commission of Accreditation of Hospitals. Anything to the contrary is unacceptable and we get NO patients....

[/quote]
</p>

<p>Military hospitals are also required to pass JCAH accreditation. If a military hospital doesn't pass accreditation, the CO's career is in jeopardy.</p>

<p>Also, Walter Reed is going to be shut down as part of Base Realignment and Closure and relocated to Bethesda, MD on the same campus as the National Naval Medical Center. The new Walter Reed will have state-of-the-art health care facilities.</p>

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<p>I think, in the interim, and I already know the flies in the ointment, they need to contract out to civ. hospitals. </p>

<p>The flies are, several of the mil. doctors don't have priv.'s there and lack of continuity of care. Also, the patient care managers (military) wouldn't have direct access to them, looping back to the continuity of care.</p>

<p>There is no easy answer, I understand, however, with this article, they'll be inspected soon, and without warning.</p>

13

<p>WRAMC passed their JCAHO inspection in the fall of 2005 while I was working there for about five months in the surgery and psychiatry departments. </p>

<p>As noted above it is not the patient care areas that are the big problem and therefore would not fall under the auspices of JCAHO. The care at WRAMC is outstanding, the problem is the housing for the outpatients. These are people who would be living at home if they lived nearby, but because they are from all parts of the country the Army puts them up while they are receiving care at WRAMC.</p>

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<p>Thanks for the educate! Like I said, before, I didn't read past the first page, since the beginning made me SICK.</p>

<p>At the mil. facilities that I've worked at, we've never had housing facilities.</p>

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<p>Pulperias refers to convenience stores or city squares where people get together. Jmwrites-I have no clue where you come up with Honduras. I'm undeterred, and I remain strong by my mantra, "American by birth, Republican by Grace of God"</p>

<p>This is another recent article from Army Times. Bill0510-When have newspapers disclosing what our recovering soldiers have to say including their requests to reform Department of Defense's military medicine become synonymous with liberal bashing?</p>

<p>Wounded and waiting
<a href="http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/02/tnsmedboards070217/%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.armytimes.com/news/2007/02/tnsmedboards070217/&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>
[quote]
"The physical evaluation board rated him at zero percent, saying the tumor was a pre-existing condition. Unbehagan has been in the Army for four years, and his doctors found no proof the tumor existed before he joined, he said.</p>

<p>Rather than face the civilian world with no benefits, he talked with a free counselor from Disabled American Veterans who told him how to fight the discharge, reclassify as an electronics and satellite repair specialist, and stay in the Army. The process took eight months, which he spent in the medical hold company.</p>

<p>His board was restarted three times: First, his medical profile was lost. Then, somebody forgot to counsel him — a required part of the process. And finally, no one made his file active after he changed his job field, so no one saved him a slot at the repair school, he said."

[/quote]
</p>

<p>
[quote]
He has spent two years at Walter Reed going through rehabilitation and waiting for his discharge, which means he hasn’t lived with his wife of 10 years for more than three years.</p>

<p>“She’s been talking about a divorce,” he said. “I just signed [my rating] so I could go home and be with my family.”</p>

<p>He said his physical evaluation board counselor was another private first class. “She didn’t know what she was doing,” he said. “Sometimes I had to tell her what was going on.”</p>

<p>The Army awarded him 20 percent disability — no medical retirement for his war injuries, and no insurance for his family.</p>

<p>“It’s frustrating when you know the love you used to have for the military, and then you lose that,” he said. “This is their job: It shouldn’t take months to give a person the same percentage you gave someone else with the same injury last week.

[/quote]
</p>

<p>
[quote]
Villalpando arrived at Walter Reed after forcing a fi****l of antidepressants down his throat. While Villalpando was in Iraq in May 2005, his cousin, Marcos Omar Nolasco, was electrocuted in a faulty shower in Baghdad.</p>

<p>“He came back from a mission, and he took a shower, and he got electrocuted,” Villalpando said, surrounded by his own artwork and a Morrissey poster at the barracks across the street from Walter Reed. “It did a good number on me. I was so close to him. I spent the remainder of my tour on antidepressants.”</p>

<p>The 7th Field Artillery, 1st Infantry Division, soldier said he attempted suicide to try to get help after falling into a depression.</p>

<p>Now his end term of service date has passed — he was to get out in August — and still he sits at Walter Reed.</p>

<p>In his case, there have been clerical errors, such as a mistyped Social Security number that meant his paperwork had to be processed again, he said.</p>

<p>“This place gets so depressing,” he said. “I’m frustrated. I’m tired. I’m angry. I want to go home.”

[/quote]
</p>

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<p>Las Pulperias is a town in Honduras. And, I'm thinking that MoralityJustice, since she is young and educable, should take her brilliance and intellect, become a doctor or a nurse, or something in medicine, and position herself in a military medical facility (ROTC with an education at, say, Johns Hopkins or perhaps Penn, comes to mind...) and instigate change from within! One person, in the thick of such a place, can, indeed, make a difference. IMHO, shouting mantras here will have much less effect (and affect, for that matter) than joining something greater than yourself and serving others in the process.</p>

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<p><a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/19/AR2007021900759.html%5B/url%5D"&gt;http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2007/02/19/AR2007021900759.html&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p>

<p>
[quote]
Walter Reed Army Medical Center began repairs today on Building 18, a former hotel used to house outpatients recuperating from combat injuries suffered in Iraq and Afghanistan, which has been plagued with mold, leaky plumbing and a broken elevator.</p>

<p>The facility's commander, Maj. Gen. George Weightman, said Army staff members inspected each of the 54 rooms at the building and discovered that outstanding repair orders for half the rooms had been completed, but he said mold removal had begun on several rooms. He also said holes in ceilings, stained carpets and leaking faucets were being fixed....

[/quote]
</p>

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<p>JMWRITES and others: I point you all to</p>

<p>Studentdoctor.net </p>

<p>and the military medicine subforum to get a good read on what current, former, and upcoming physicians within the military medicine system have to say about the current state of affairs. It should be an eye opener.</p>

19

<p>i don't want to jump in the larger argument about the need for military medicine reform, but i will say that any one who has been to brigade medical or hospital point here on the yard will tell you how ridiculous it is. there's a joke in the brigade that you can go down to medical with the flu, a broken arm and food poisoning and come out with the same diagnosis ("viral syndrome") on your siq chit and the same prescription: cough drops and about 50 ibuprofen. i could wax lyrical about the many demonstrations of their incompetence: i was told 4 times last year i had mono, when in each case it turned out to be strep throat, and before spring break last year i went out to hospital point for their "pre-spring break checkup", which turned out to be 70 pages of photocopied material on every possible disease you could catch in mexico and an hour long trip down the nurse's memory lane regarding her numerous experiences with montezuma's revenge-delicious, i assure you. one of my boyfriend's classmates was recently given a ***** pump worth 600$-by brigade medical, who prescribed it for a sore groin. amazing use of tax dollars.
the corpsmen are notorious for their laziness (i'm not trying to be harsh, just honest). they would very much rather give you some cough drops or some anti-diarrheal than take the time to schedule you for an appointment with an actual doctor. if anywhere needs to be overhauled-they should start in bancroft hall.</p>

20

<p>i should add that i am very grateful that we have a medical clinic in the hall and that we are lucky enough to have our medical expenses covered by the navy-its just that i wish brigade medical had a little higher standards.</p>