Will the Pentagon Talk to the VA?

http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/peter-g-cohen/50508/will-the-pentagon-talk-to-the-va

Will the Pentagon Talk to the VA?
by Peter G. Cohen | July 9, 2013 - 7:43am

We have been fighting two bloody wars for more than a decade, yet neither the Pentagon nor the Veterans’ Administration took the trouble to create a compatible records system that would smooth the transition from military care to VA care of our wounded service people.

By the end of 2008, the U.S. had spent approximately $900 billion in direct costs on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and created more than 33,000 wounded. Yet they didn’t think to coordinate their medical records in advance of the veteran homecoming.

Meanwhile, the Department of Defense’s FY 2011 $137.5 billion procurement and $77.2 billion RDT&E budget requests were increased over 2010. But the outdated, incompatible medical records systems remained the same! Perhaps buying and implementing new medical records doesn’t get the Pentagon brass a fancy job on retirement, but it certainly would have served our troops more effectively than these lavish expenditures. (Figures from Wikipedia)

~snip~

Effective today, every regional office will begin implementing an initiative to ensure that those who have been waiting a year or more for their compensation claim receive a decision quickly. VA raters will make provisional decisions on the oldest claims in inventory, which will allow Veterans to begin collecting compensation benefits more quickly, if eligible.....” April 19, 2013 by Allison Hickey, a retired U.S. Air Force Brigadier General, is VA’s Under Secretary for Benefits.