New VA patients younger, more likely women

[unhappycamper]

New VA patients younger, more likely women
By Kimberly Hefling - The Associated Press
Posted : Monday Dec 14, 2009 15:03:13 EST

MARTINSBURG, W.Va. — Doctors at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in this quiet, bucolic town tucked between coal country and the nation's capital used to go months without treating a female veteran.

Today, they're reporting the beginning of a boom.

Mixed with the Vietnam and World War II-era patients waiting for a doctor are 20-something women who served in Iraq and Afghanistan, reading Allure magazine and, in some cases, coming in for pregnancy tests.

The hospital sees nearly twice as many women it did before the Sept. 11 attacks. Administrators opened a women's clinic and are trying to take female veterans into consideration when deciding everything from the color of the walls to the size of the prosthetics offered. Waiting areas soon will have kid-friendly tables. An onsite day care for veterans with medical appointments is under review.

"It's not the old guys group anymore," said Ann Brown, the medical center director, from her office inside the brown brick hospital not far from Harpers Ferry. "It's women and it's younger, and the younger folks, they need more than just medical care. They've got family issues. They need help reintegrating in how to get back into their jobs."


Rest of article at: http://www.armytimes.com/news/2009/12/ap_women_treatments_121409/