Palo Alto VA positions itself within national scandal

What should not get lost in this current controversy is that the VA provides great health care to the vast majority of the veterans entrusted to their care and that 99% of the VA employees are doing a superb job. I know this from very personal experience - I am an Agent Orange Vietnam veteran who was diagnosed with incurable leukemia 12 years ago. For the last 12 years I have received all of my medical care at the Palo Alto VA and that care has been superb. I make this statement with some personal familiarity with health care delivery having been the Executive Director of the Stanford University Medical Center.

Yes, let's clean up the current mess but don't overlook all the great work done by VA employees every day.

Peter,

I agree with you. Here's a relevant post by Phillip Longman in Washington Monthly that explains the issue well.

Web Link

Odd that the ones calling the loudest for General Shinseki's resignation were the ones that filibusters a VA healthcare improvement bill earlier this year.

And as soon as Shinseki resigned, you haven't heard a peep from them about fixing the issues at hand, except for a few that want to push VA privatization.

Never mind, as bad as McCain is with his flipflops: Web Link

"Senate Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., a Vietnam War veteran, announced the compromise on the Senate floor.
The legislation allows the construction of 26 major medical facilities in 18 states around the country and authorize $500 million in unobligated funds to hiring new doctors and health care providers. More facilities and more doctors will mitigate the long waiting times facing veterans. The legislation would also include a two-year trial program to make it easier for veterans to seek private care if VA care is inaccessible, as well as grant greater authority to the VA secretary to fire senior executives."

Let's see if McCain can get any votes from the party that had him as their presidential candidate a few years ago.

Mike - Thanks for the great article from Washington Monthly, he says it much better than I did.

I give the Palo Alto VA high marks for the care and attention I have received .
I recommend Palo Alto VA to all Veterans.This Hospital is the tightest run Hospital I have been in.
Lisa Freeman is on her Job.Don't Mess With The Palo Alto VA.

VA Palo Alto needs to be investigated by the Office of Inspector General with the same rigor as all other VA's. The comment by Ruben not to mess with the Palo Alto VA and that Lisa Freeman is on her job is an assumption that cannot be made until the report is complete.

I take my brother to the Palo Alto VA system frequently and the care has been superb, far better than I've seen from private providers.

Although the VA Palo Alto has a great reputation, it should be inspected to the fullest extent.

My Dad was a disabled vet from WWII. The health care back east took care of him for many years until his death , in a VA hospital. It took emergency services: Code blue! too long to respond to his critical condition, while in their care. The biggest problem back then and now is staffing issues. They need more staff to accommodate these heroes that have served our county. Service at the VA relies on 2 classifications: service connected and non service connected. Service connected get the top service and non service connected must wait. In all these inquiries, I never heard what ones were service and non service connected? Maybe the service connected ones should be the only ones seen at the VA facilities and non service connected should be given a voucher, to obtain care from another non VA facility? Many countries...Germany as one! take care of their veterans a lot better than we do here. didn't they lose WW II?

Washington......needs to fix the problem now!

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