The Veterans Choice Act is a worthless piece of paper that sounds good for a sound bite.
Via NWI Com:
Hobart resident Carlos Villarreal squabbled with Veterans Affairs officials for months over getting an MRI to assess his nerve damage from a mortar attack in Iraq. He finally had the test done — 2,000 miles away.
The disabled Marine veteran gets his care through Jesse Brown VA Medical Center on Chicago’s West Side, but that facility doesn’t have an open MRI, which he says he needs because of claustrophobia from his post-traumatic-stress disorder.
He tried to have the testing done locally under the Veterans Choice Act, which is supposed to allow vets to seek care in the community if they can’t get treatment quick or close enough through the VA. The law was passed in response to the discovery that dozens of veterans in Phoenix had died while waiting for care.
But problems with that program’s vendor for Northwest Indiana, Health Net Federal Services, have left many veterans unable to make appointments and many providers not getting paid in a timely fashion. Villarreal, 31, was one of several Region vets featured in a December Times article that documented issues with the program.
Then in March, he went on vacation to Puerto Rico.
While he was down in the U.S. territory, he stopped at a local VA medical center. He found it had an open MRI. He had the testing on the spot.
“I got it done in less than a day,” he said, behind the wheel of his SUV on a recent morning headed to the VA hospital in Chicago. “How long did it take me here?”
He started trying to get the MRI last July. In the months to follow, he spent hours on the phone with VA and Choice officials attempting to schedule the test, according to recordings of the conversations he shared with The Times. The calls would be familiar to anyone who’s ever been stuck in customer service purgatory.