Veterans Administration

12 Stories

VA Hospital Employee Under Review After Facebook Photo

Facebook post says 2 veterans were mistreated at VA hospital

(Newser) - A former Marine and his wife say the scene inside a Veterans Administration hospital in Durham, North Carolina, was so shocking that they felt compelled to take pictures and post them to Facebook. Now thousands of people are expressing outrage, and the head of the medical center says an employee...

VA Clinic Shooter Was Iraq Vet
 VA Clinic Shooter Was Iraq Vet 
Jan 8, 2015 3:00 AM CST

VA Clinic Shooter Was Iraq Vet

Jerry Serrato worked as clerk at El Paso clinic

(Newser) - An Army veteran who fatally shot a psychologist at a West Texas veterans' hospital before killing himself was a former clerk at the clinic and had threatened the doctor in 2013, the FBI says. The gunman has been identified as Jerry Serrato, a 48-year-old who was medically discharged from the...

2K US Veterans Lobotomized in '40s, '50s

'WSJ' profiles Walter Freeman's medical legacy

(Newser) - In the first detailed account of the Veterans Administration's psychosurgery program, the Wall Street Journal reveals the extent to which lobotomies were used on veterans in the 1940s and '50s, before antipsychotic drugs came on the market and public opinion dipped. Unearthed documents show how one of the...

Workload at Costly VA Call Centers: 2 Calls a Day

...so they decided to go 24/7

(Newser) - The Veterans Affairs Department has spent millions on employment call centers so overstaffed that workers only handle a call or two per day, inspectors have discovered. The two centers—operated by a private contractor—handled an average of 2.4 calls per operator daily between December 2011 and December 2012,...

Rare Bug Kills SF Disease Researcher, 25

CDC probing Richard Din's death

(Newser) - A young researcher at the San Francisco Veterans Affairs Medical Center has been killed by the rare strain of bacteria that he was researching. Richard Din, 25, died in the hospital where he worked just 17 hours after coming down with a bloodstream infection caused by the bacterium Neisseria meningitidis,...

Lack of Health Insurance Kills 2K Veterans a Year

2,266 died last year, a study finds

(Newser) - Some 2,266 US veterans under 65 died last year because they didn't have health insurance, a team from Harvard Medical School estimates. Although most vets get medical care through the VA, there are about a million and a half, under 65, who were not wounded and are "too...

Obama to Vets: Afghan War Is 'of Necessity'

Prez also assures VFW confab that medical benefits won't change

(Newser) - President Obama defended the war in Afghanistan, spoke optimistically about Iraq, and tried to iron out misconceptions about health care reform today in a speech at a VFW convention, the Washington Post reports. “The insurgency in Afghanistan didn't just happen overnight. And we won't defeat it overnight,” he...

New GI Bill Pays Out Big in Some States, Zilch in Others

(Newser) - The new GI bill going into effect Aug. 1 is the biggest expansion of the program since World War II, but the benefits are far from uniform, the AP reports. The new system determines the money a vet gets for college on a state-by-state basis. Full tuition is guaranteed at...

Open-Source Software a Cheap Fix for Hospitals

(Newser) - Hospitals around the country are scrambling to comply with a federal mandate that they digitize their records systems, and one Texas hospital is an example of how to do that virtually for free, the Wall Street Journal reports. Developed with billions of taxpayer dollars, the Veterans Health Administration’s software...

Panel: Don't Screen Older Men for Prostate Cancer

Treatment may be more harmful than helpful after the age of 74

(Newser) - Physicians should stop screening men 75 and older for prostate cancer, according to new guidelines issued by national health task force. Prostate cancer is "overdiagnosed" in up to 44% of cases—that is, the cancer is present but so slow growing that it would probably never produce symptoms in...

Obama Wants Probe of VA Drug Tests
Obama Wants Probe of VA Drug Tests
Jun 18, 2008 12:23 PM CDT

Obama Wants Probe of VA Drug Tests

'Outrageous' that suicide-linked drugs were tested on vets

(Newser) - Barack Obama and Republican Sen. John Cornyn are seeking a probe into reports that veterans had been recruited for tests on drugs linked to suicide, ABC News reports. An ABC News/Washington Times story noted that vets were given the anti-smoking drug Chantix in government tests, but for more than three...

Vets Used to Test Drugs Linked to Suicide

VA accused of treating troubled patients like 'lab rats'

(Newser) - Combat veterans suffering post-traumatic stress disorder were recruited for clinical trials of drugs linked to suicide and mental disorders, ABC reports. In a trial involving the smoking-cessation drug Chantix, the VA did not warn patients of the drug's serious potential side effects until 3 months after the FDA and the...

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