LETTER: Vets getting runaround?

Do you remember when Congress passed the Veterans Choice bill? Well, it may sound good but here is what I think about it. It’s just another thing that the government can’t get right.

Yes, it sounds good, and they can brag about helping vets and just maybe it is helping some, and I hope it is, but I doubt if very many.

Now I have used the local veterans clinic here almost from the time they started and have nothing but good to say about the wonderful doctors, nurses and staff. They are kind, caring and I believe have nothing but our best interests at heart.

I have also had cancer surgery at Fort Harrison and was confined and treated there for blood clots in my lungs. I can honestly say I have never had better care in any other hospital.

Now, on to my complaint. The V.A. furnishes eyeglasses to vets and before Congress got involved with their choice program, you just got your doctor to OK an exam, which you got and your prescription was sent to the fort and within about three weeks you had your glasses.

Last year, about the first of September, I requested an exam. It took to almost the end of November and after three phonecalls from Veterans Choice to get an appointment, which they made for me, they were billed on Nov. 20 and to date have not paid the provider. It took almost until the end of March to get my glasses. That’s almost four months, and I believe I got them only because Sen. Daines’ office was hounding them, and then I could not use them because the prescription was wrong.

I have talked to several other vets and some are even employed by the Veterans Administration, and get the same thing from them: It was good before Congress got involved, but now I am getting billed for something I should not be. You know they tell you if you have an emergency, you can first go to a hospital before notifying them for approval. No way would I count on them. I can visualize a bill so large that you would lose everything before they got around to paying, if they ever did.

Fortunately in my case, I have Medicare but we have a lot of younger vets that could go through hell trying to get their bills paid, as I understand this whole program was outsourced to a private company, and it appears to me like Congress just does not care enough to see that it’s being run right.

—Glen Hook, Kalispell