Top 10 Veterans News from Around the Country 5-29-09

What’s Inside Today’s Local News for Veterans

1. VA Awards Money For Rural Area Clinics.  
2. Lawmakers Announce Grant For New Vets Home In North Dakota.  
3. Obama To Visit Wounded Troops In Germany Next Week.  
4. VA Patients Fish With Pro Football Players.   
5. California Vets Heading To Golden Age Games.
6. Montana’s Two Mobile Vet Centers Noted.  
7. Systems Struggling To Implement EMRs.  
8. VA Hospital To Observe Memorial Day On Saturday.  
9. Hearing Will Examine VA Mistakes That Exposed Vets To Infectious Diseases.  
10. Location Of Regional VA Clinic Still To Be Decided. 

1.      VA Awards Money For Rural Area Clinics.   The Laughlin Nevada Times (5/29, Maniaci) reports US Rep. Dina Titus (D-NV) "announced on May 21 that $1.1 million has been allocated for the Laughlin military veterans outreach clinic." The "money is part of $215 million for 74 projects to assist veterans in rural areas across the country." The Nevada "project will establish a part-time outreach clinic for primary care, mental health, and ancillary health care services to more than 1,300 veterans," Titus "said in a letter to Department of Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki. She urged him to have the department quickly build the clinic."
      The Saipan Tribune (5/29, Rodriguez) reports the US VA "recently awarded" the Commonwealth of the Northern Mariana Islands (CNMI) "$891,235 to build an outreach clinic on Saipan." This "amount is part of the 74 awards that VA announced last week for veterans in rural areas, according to an e-mail from Bob Schwalbach, chief of staff of CNMI Delegate Gregorio ‘Kilili’ C. Sablan." Schwalbach "said that Sablan met with…James E. Hastings, MD," the director of the VA Pacific Islands Health Care System, "in Honolulu in March to talk about the clinic and to encourage VA to reach out to veterans in the Marianas. ‘Kilili is very grateful to Dr. Hastings…and to’" Secretary Shinseki.

2.      Lawmakers Announce Grant For New Vets Home In North Dakota.   The Jamestown (ND) Sun (5/28) noted that on Thursday, US Sens. Byron Dorgan and Kent Conrad and Rep. Earl Pomeroy, all Democrats, announced that the US Department of Veterans Affairs "has approved a $14.7 million" Federal grant "to construct a new state Veterans Home" in Lisbon, North Dakota. The "grant will cover 65 percent of the cost of replacing the North Dakota Veterans Home, which had structural problems and had outlived its useful lifetime." The Sun added, "The North Dakota delegation pressed the Department of Veterans Affairs to ensure the Lisbon project was at the top of its priority list," and the "previous secretary" of Veterans Affairs "assured the delegation it was. This funding fulfills that commitment to the project."

3.      Obama To Visit Wounded Troops In Germany Next Week.   The AP (5/28) reports President Obama "will visit wounded US troops when he travels to Germany next week." The White House "announced Thursday that Obama will visit the troops and their families at the military hospital in Landstuhl. Obama is visiting Germany June 5 as part of a previously announced trip that includes stops in Saudi Arabia, Egypt and France." The AP adds that "some Republicans had criticized the president during his European trip in April because he made no plans to visit the American military hospital." AFP (5/28) says "the Pentagon advised Obama last year that he could visit the military hospital in Germany only in his official capacity as a senator, without the trappings of a political campaign." Obama, who was "then the presumptive Democratic nominee, cancelled the visit after deciding the stop on his campaign plane with staff and reporters in tow would be inappropriate as part of a trip financed by his White House effort."
   

4.      VA Patients Fish With Pro Football Players.   ESPNOutdoors.com (5/28, Jarrett) noted that earlier this month, wounded members of the US Armed Forces from the Veterans Affairs medical center in Augusta, Georgia, attended a "community outreach event hosted" by the National Football League’s Atlanta Falcons. During the event, "soldiers cast for fish alongside the likes of Pro Bowl receiver Roddy White and center Todd McClure, who has started 134 of 137 games in his 11-year NFL career."

5.      California Vets Heading To Golden Age Games.   In the fourth story for his Modesto (CA) Bee (5/28) "Bowling" column, Dallas Kadry wrote, "Good luck this coming week to our six veterans heading for the 23rd National Veterans Golden Age Games" in Birmingham, Alabama. Kadry said, "Richard Torres, Gerald Lewis, Steve Loua, Floyd Cunningham, Tony Gomez and Leo Renkel will be representing Modesto in several events, including bowling. The games start Monday and run through the week."

6.      Montana’s Two Mobile Vet Centers Noted.   On its website, KPAX-TV Missoula, MT (5/28) said Mobile Vet Centers are providing a "new and easier way for Montana war veterans to get help with military trauma." There are two "such centers in Montana, one in Missoula and the other one in Billings. The Missoula center covers the western part of the state while the Billings center covers the other areas of the state."

7.      Systems Struggling To Implement EMRs.   The Financial Times (5/29, Timmins) reports, "Across the world," healthcare systems are investing in electronic medical records (EMRs), "even if getting them up and running is proving a struggle everywhere," in part because such records "radically alter the way…health professionals work. That requires huge investments of time and effort, not just the acquisition and installation of systems and equipment. In the US," for example, "the healthcare organisations that are most advanced," including the Veterans Health Administration, "have invested at least as much in training and implementation as in systems and often more."

8.      VA Hospital To Observe Memorial Day On Saturday.   The Arizona Daily Star (5/29) says, "Memorial Day observances may be over in most of Tucson, but not at the city’s veterans hospital." The Southern Arizona Veterans Affairs Health Care System "cleaves to history by holding its annual remembrance service on May 30," the "historical date for Memorial Day until Congress changed the rules in 1971, declaring that the holiday would fall on the last Monday of May each year, creating a three-day weekend."

9.      Hearing Will Examine VA Mistakes That Exposed Vets To Infectious Diseases.   In continuing coverage, the AP (5/29) reports, "Mistakes that put patients at three Department of Veterans Affairs" facilities "at risk of possible exposure to HIV and other infectious body fluids will be discussed by a congressional panel." The House Committee on Veterans Affairs oversight and investigations subcommittee "has set a June 16 hearing in Washington, D.C., on ‘Endoscopy Procedures at the VA, What Happened and What Has Changed.’" The AP adds, "Among more than 10,000 former VA patients in Murfreesboro, Miami and Augusta, Ga., who the VA has warned to get follow-up blood checks, five have tested positive for HIV and 39 have tested positive for hepatitis."10.    Location Of Regional VA Clinic Still To Be Decided.   The Cody (WY) Enterprise (5/29, Inbody) reports West Park Hospital (WPH) "is back in the running as host" for a regional Veterans Affairs clinic now that the "April decision to award the clinic for the next five years to Powell Valley Healthcare has been overturned." Sterling Healthcare, "which made plans to run the clinic in the new Cathcart Health Center, appealed the VA’s decision." The Enterprise adds, "Powell has had the clinic since 1999," but in "an April interview, a VA spokesman said Sterling did not respond to requests for information and was declared ‘nonresponsive.’"
      The Powell (WY) Tribune (5/29, Olson) reports, "Rod Barton, chief executive officer for Powell Valley Healthcare, told the organization’s board on Monday that contract was rescinded after Sterling Medical Corporation filed a protest." Barton "said it’s his understanding that the Veterans Affairs official that Sterling worked with for the bid left that office and was replaced by another person, but Sterling wasn’t advised of that and continued to send information to the original contact. Consequently, some of the information the company sent was not included in Sterling’s bid packet, and the bid was declared incomplete."