Jim Fausone
Veteran Disability Lawyer

It seems like the DOD and VA fight the most obvious and necessary things.  Think about the atomic registry, the Gulf War registry, AO registry, etc.  This time it’s the burn pits our men and women were exposed to inIraq andAfghanistan.  Over objections from the VA, a House panel voted last week to create a registry of people exposed to toxic fumes and chemicals from open burn pits while deployed toIraq andAfghanistan.  The registry would be used to monitor the health of service members and veterans to determine if there are any ill effects from being close to or downwind of the open fires used to dispose of solid waste in Iraq and Afghanistan.

 As reported in the Army Times: “VA, however, doesn’t see the need for the registry. Officials say there are other ways to identify and track Iraq and Afghanistan veterans exposed to burn pits without a special registry — and they are not convinced burn pits even posed a serious problem.

VA officials told the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, which is considering similar legislation, that an independent report by theInstituteofMedicine“identified air pollution, rather than smoke from burn pits, as the most concerning potential environmental hazard.”   

Will it again take 20 years for VA to recognize that serious health concerns exist because of this exposure?

http://www.armytimes.com/news/2012/06/military-lawmakers-vote-to-create-burn-pit-registry-062912w/

Jim Fausone
Veteran Disability Lawyer

For years it has been known that the drinking water at Camp Lejuene was contaminated with a soup of chemicals from DOD operations at the site.  Congressional committees are wrapping up negotiations for expanding veterans’ health care by proposing VA treat veterans and dependents exposed to contaminated well water at Camp Lejeune, N.C.  Up to 750,000 people — Navy and Marine Corps members and their families — may have been exposed to water found to be contaminated by carcinogens from the 1950s into the 1980s.   This is one of those embarrassments by DOD that far too long to correct.  We have been hearing about veterans with contaminated water related diseases for over a decade.

VA was never going to wholesale approve disability claims for such exposure without Congressional action because of the cost implications.  Let’s hope that this sordid chapter is now behind us and Congress authorizes the funds and VA gets on with providing care and treatment to those exposed in a compassionate and timely manner.  Read more about this at the Navy Times article below.

http://www.navytimes.com/news/2012/06/military-lawmakers-propose-va-care-for-those-exposed-to-lejeune-water-062212w/

by Jim Fausone
Veterans Disability Lawyer

We hear from over 400 veterans a month seeking our help; not knowing where to turn.  Often it is on disability matters that we can help with – such as obtaining VA disability benefits.  Some of the email requests are simply matters we do not work on – such as educational or home loan matters.  We also hear tragic stories where the system has failed our veterans.  Here is an email request we just received:

“I’m not sure I am at the right place, but I will tell you my story and let you decide. My nephew John Saxon served 4 years in the US Army spending 1 tour in Iraq for 18 months. He was honorably discharged after his 4 year commitment was finished. After 3 years of inactive duty he was recalled to spend another 1 year tour in Iraq. John has battled PTSD since his return over a year ago. He was seen by a VA doctor in Dallas approx. a month ago and was advised to see a psychiatrist and was put on psyche meds. This morning John snapped and killed his mother by shooting her and setting her house on fire. John now sits in the Grayson County(TX) jail on murder charges. My question is what if anything can your organization do and if nothing can you suggest any places I can contact for further help.”

The Army failed John when it discharged him without proper care. The VA failed John when it did not get him immediate help but simply said see another doctor.  The Country failed John when we asked him to defend our values but we did not defend him from the demons that resulted.  Although it may be too late for John & his mom, we did not want to fail this family one more time.  We pointed them to a group in Texas that should be able to help.  The importance of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and psychiatric care for our veterans cannot be overestimated.  John is a statistic of the war and now so is his mother. We have seen veteran suicide, criminal activity and homelessness rise.  Many of these problems are rooted in mental illness that needs treatment.  As we pull troops out of Afghanistan and Iraq; the Department of Defense (DOD) assists the VA in taking care of the troops after discharge.  So much more needs to be done for our returning veterans.

http://www.heralddemocrat.com/hd/News/-Homicide-MaryLeeSaxon-10-28-11-

John’s sad story is reported in the article above.  You will note that they don’t make the connection to his PTSD with his service.   Maybe we can ignore it if it’s just a deranged son and his mom in a trailer.  We should be outraged and the reporter should tell the real story.

To learn more or to contact a Veterans disability lawyer, Veterans disability attorney, Veterans lawyer, or Veterans attorney call 1.800.693.4800 or visit Legalhelpforveterans.com

by Kristina Derro
Veterans Disability Attorney

On May 25, 2011, Senator Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) introduced the Honoring All Veterans Act of 2011, which seeks to improve aid and services to veterans in the areas of employment, housing, education, and health care. The Act aims at aiding veterans who are seeking education and employment by increasing the number of participants in independent living programs that allow veterans to participate in family and community life, increasing their potential to return to work. It will also provide funding for outreach on college campuses to help veterans maximize their ability to study and gain employment.

The Act authorizes the Department of Defense (DoD) to study how to ensure that civilian employers and educational institutions recognize veterans’ military training and qualifications—transferring the certificates and licensed skills from the military to civilian jobs would ensure that the training that occurred during service was not lost for veterans returning to the civilian workplace. It also authorizes that veterans can use the DoD’s Transition Assistance Program and meet with counselors at any military installation for up to one year after leaving service to receive information about job hunting, education options, and career development.

To address the rising amount of homeless veterans that is estimated to be 76,000 in 2009, the Honoring All Veterans Act provides services to military families who are on the verge of losing their home by permanently extending their foreclosure protection. The Act will also raise the per diem rate that certain programs give out, in an effort to take into account the geographic disparities around the nation.

The Honoring All Veterans Act attempts to deal with the health care shortcomings in the treatment of veterans. The Act authorizes VA to access state prescription drug monitoring programs in order to address substance abuse. It also allows military family members to access VA counseling services while a service member is deployed, and it directs the VA to improve rehabilitation and reintegration plans that address long term care for veterans with traumatic brain injuries (TBIs). The overall goal of the Act is to modernize the VA—to streamline the transition from active service to veteran status for service members, to have a responsive Board of Veterans Appeals handling disability claims, and to be constantly updating pension amounts to reflect the cost of living.

To learn more or to contact a Veterans disability lawyer, Veterans disability attorney, Veterans lawyer, or Veterans attorney call 1.800.693.4800 or visit Legalhelpforveterans.com

by Kristina Derro
Veterans Disability Lawyer

The Senate Veterans Affairs Committee heard testimony on Wednesday, May 18, 2011 regarding the historically rocky transition for service members between leaving the Department of Defense (DoD) and beginning to receive medical treatment through the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Researchers found that increasing levels of drug abuse and suicides among recently-separated combat veterans can be partly blamed on inadequate coordination as service members are discharged from the military and become the responsibility of VA.

A lack of coordination was also found to negatively affect the treatment of combat-related injuries. At the DoD, injured service members receive state-of-the-art care, receive counseling services, and are prescribed narcotics to treat pain. When service members are discharged and begin to receive their medical care from VA, research has shown that VA improperly manages their narcotic medications, making them more likely to abuse drugs, become homeless, or commit suicide. Further, due to a rocky handoff, veterans at VA also have physicians who are unfamiliar with the course of treatment that those veterans were receiving while with the DoD.

The area of prosthetics is one example where the lack of coordination and lack of familiarity hurt the veterans. The DoD has outstanding prosthetics for its amputees. Upon arrival at VA, many VA physicians are fascinated by the high-tech devices, having never seen them before, and are more interested in examining the devices rather than examining the veterans.

Both the Deputy Secretary of Defense and the Deputy Secretary of Veterans Affairs recognized the need for a truly seamless handoff from the DoD to the VA medical facilities. Recognizing the problem is the first step, however it seems that the VA has a history of being unable to rectify the problems even though they have been sufficiently identified.

To learn more or to contact a Veterans disability lawyer, Veterans disability attorney, Veterans lawyer, or Veterans attorney call 1.800.693.4800 or visit Legalhelpforveterans.com

by Kristina Derro
Veterans Disability Attorney

Sixteen men and women who were raped and assaulted during active service filed a recent lawsuit against the Pentagon. The lawsuit accuses the military of condoning a culture that fails to prosecute the offenders of sex crimes and instead punishes the sexual assault victims who come forward to report the incidents.

According to a recent report by the Department of Defense (DOD), last year 3,158 sexual assaults were reported by men and women in the Armed Forces. The DOD estimates that this number reflects only about 13.5% of the total number of assaults on men and women in active duty last year. Experts say that the number of reported sexual assaults in the military is so low because of the fact that victims often receive pressure from supervisors and peers to not report anything. Further, once reports are made, the victims are often viewed as “troublemakers”, the sexual offenders are rarely disciplined by the military, and the victims often get transferred out of his/her military occupational specialty and into a new job—instead of forcing the sexual offender to be relocated. Seeing victims treated in this manner acts as a deterrent in the reporting of sexual assaults by other victims.

Adding to the problem is that while sexual trauma victims are in the military, they are away from family and friends who are the traditional support system in times of stress. Instead, the victims have to rely on receiving their support entirely from the military itself—the same establishment that refuses to acknowledge the problem or punish the offender.

VA health care systems have seen a large influx in military sexual trauma survivors. So much so that several VA medical centers have employed social workers on a full-time basis whose only job is to counsel those victims of military sexual trauma. There is movement afoot in the Armed Services to start training active duty members at an early age, even beginning in boot camp, about how to prevent sexual assault and how to intervene if they see someone being sexually harassed or assaulted. It has been recognized that there needs to be something done to prevent military sexual trauma from happening in the first instance.

To learn more or to contact a Veterans disability lawyer, Veterans disability attorney, Veterans lawyer, or Veterans attorney call 1.800.693.4800 or visit Legalhelpforveterans.com