VA only pays for services they can't do themselves and if it's so far away. Also, if you live outside the US, you can bill them for regular doctor visits. BUT you have to pay for it first and ask for reimbursement if not mistaken, and they can also deny it for whatever reasons. It's bullshit.
I've been dealing with it like it's a full time job since 2004. The BEST thing they could do would be to liquidate the hospitals and equipment to local hospitals. Then just give vets insurance cards and let them get whatever healthcare they need on a single payer system (what we should have all gotten with Obamacare, but that's another issue).
But this way, I wouldn't have to put up with bullshit, half ass healthcare, etc. I'd be able to go to a doc, if he's a dickbag, I can go to another, easy peasy. As it is now, VA is definition of Catch 22, damned if you do, damned if you don't, and just when you think you're winning --you're actually losing!
This shit has to change. "Just About Had It" was the headline this morning. "Just about" is putting it lightly. I've had it up to *here* for a while now. I DO use a civilian doctor for pain, but may be forced to outsource more docs, as at the rate their going, I'm at risk for losing my toe or foot due to sore under a callus that got infected... They could care less. Treated me like I was less than dirt. I'm sick of it.
Maybe if VA won't give them the incentive to do their job, perhaps we should. How?
A lot of docs at VA are passing through, easy money, no real work. So one way would be to purchase their names on Google, if you have doc that wrongs you it shouldn't cost too much, then everytime he gets searched, now or in the future, when he's moved on and has a practice and wants to be a "good" doctor now, then every search will be plagued with his misdeeds at VA --they'll follow him for life and they'll be among the first search items.
Not the first time this has been done, and not the first time it's brought someone down. It may be the only way to hold them accountable, because as it stands, they walk out of there with a glowing review, stellar resume, letters of commendation --and for what? Being the bottom of the barrel?
Excuses to the good docs at VA. But the same mechanism used bring down bad ones would also serve to raise up the good ones.
Your incentive program? I told them how to save millions on shipping charges --they send me refills, monthly ones, but they come at different time and it cost, I learned, $7 per package. But they could put all them in there and mail the whole month's worth for $7 AND cost me just one trip to the PO. When I told 'em about it? They didn't care. Said it wasn't my problem, that's how they did it and not to worry about it. When I put in a formal complaint, I never heard of it again. I DID find out there was a huge scandal that mailed my meds from TN, they had a crooked deal going on for supplies there, tape or labels or some shit. It FINALLY got investigated, but only because of employee fraud on a scale that couldn't be ignored, plus a guy that got screwed in the deal ratted, otherwise it may still be going on. But they still waste money this way mailing meds nearly ten years later. So good luck with that.
Not only all that, I'm tired of ladies with 3" nails trying to operate a computer, with an attitude bigger than the VA itself and who have no idea how a QWERTY keyboard operates. How did they get this job? And sending me to a specialist, then having me see a student who misrepresents his or herself as a qualified doctor, that's medical malpractice, right? If I never see a doctor but am led to believe I am? Nurses, ARNP's, PA's, students --if no badge and you call them a doctor and they go along with that, don't correct you, that's fraud IMO.
And these waiting lists? Goddamn. It's getting REALLY OLD!
