Veterans wait too long for mental health services, reports say

[alp227]

Source: The Washington Post

Veterans diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder and other mental health issues often face “unconscionable” waits for treatment that leave them at risk of suicide, according to testimony at a Senate hearing Thursday and new reports from the Department of Veterans Affairs inspector general.

The reports come as VA faces unprecedented demand for mental health services from veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan. More than 202,000 veterans from those conflicts have been seen for potential PTSD at VA facilities through March 31, according to data released Wednesday. This is an increase of 10,000 veterans from the last quarterly report.

Retired Army Spec. Daniel Williams, who suffered a traumatic brain injury in Iraq from a makeshift bomb that also left him with PTSD, told the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs Thursday that when he tried to reschedule an appointment to enable him to testify, he was told he would have to wait four months for a new date.

“I’m sorry not only do I have to go through this, but many of my fellow soldiers have to as well,” said Williams, who served with the 4th Infantry Division. He testified that he attempted suicide in 2004 after being unable to get psychiatric help but was saved when his gun misfired.

Read more: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hearing-veterans-wait-too-long-for-mental-health-services/2011/07/14/gIQAcAd7EI_story.html

[RandySF]

1. Most people do.

I know a woman who was assaulted at a location in the East Bay. She thought she was fine when an appointment brought her close to the physical location where it happened. She said it only passed through her mind for a moment when she passed the very same street. But an hour after got home, she felt extremely tired, then irritable. Two hours after she was home, she was physically shaking and in tears. She got therapy after that.

[No Elephants]

2. In Biblical times, people thought mental/emotional problems meant possession by Satan.

Physically ill people needed ministering to and healing, maybe a miracle or two. Mentally/emotionally ill people needed to have demons cast out.

That primitive mentality survives today in the distinctions we and our private and public institutions make between a mentally ill person and a physically ill person.

[Maine_Nurse]

3. The sad fact is that we...

lack the capacity to care for our severely acute patients with mental health disorders, let alone those that are less acute. I work at a locked-down inpatient psychiatric unit. By the time we get patients, it is not uncommon for them to have been waiting in an ED for 2-3 days by then. All the psych beds in the state are full over 75% of the time (unofficially, in my experience it is closer to 99%). With the new situation of instant psychosis via "bath salts", the situation is pretty critical right now.

We also lack capacity to care for our non-acute patients, which can make the acute situation even worse. We frequently have patients that are no longer a danger to self or others that we cannot discharge because there is no place to send them where they can get medication administration (many of these patients are not capable of taking their own meds without prompting).

The situation is little better in this state for functional people with mental health issues. We only have handfuls of psychologists and psychiatrists in private practice and they can seldom accept new patients. My hospital's outpatient services are perpetually over capacity, as are all the other psych hospitals with outpatient departments.

[pasto76]

4. "but was saved when his gun misfired." THAT makes me believe in a God

sgt p

[Solly Mack]

5. K&R .... HAVE to wait - it should read

[JustABozoOnThisBus]

6. Both interpretations are probably correct

Vets wait too long to ask for help, AND when they apply, the VA is slow to respond.

But, it seems that once a vet gets through all the administrative paperwork and approvals, the medical care in the VA is competent and pretty quick. This from a few family members and friends who are "in" the system.

[Solly Mack]

7. The article states they have to wait. The headline is misleading regarding

the contents of the article. The article isn't about veterans waiting to seek help - it's about the VA system waiting too long to give them help and the inexcusable wait time for treatments and appointments. That was what I was addressing....the headline of the article.


And speaking as an active duty military spouse, making soldiers wait for treatment is par for the course....disgusting and completely without a legitimate excuse...but definitely not the exception.