House Committee Approves Bill That Would Improve Veterans' Outpatient Care

Main Category: Veterans / Ex-Servicemen
Article Date: 23 Mar 2007 - 2:00 PDT

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The House Armed Services Committee on Tuesday unanimously approved legislation (HR 1538) intended to improve care for wounded soldiers treated at military outpatient facilities, CongressDaily reports. The legislation was spurred by reports of inadequate outpatient facilities at Walter Reed Army Medical Center. The bill would establish case managers to help soldiers navigate through the outpatient system, with each case manager limited to 17 patients. It also would establish service member advocates to help patients with personal issues and medical advocates to help patients navigate through the medical evaluation board process. In addition, the bill would establish:

• A toll-free hotline to report problems in care and a plan to resolve problems within 96 hours of the call;
  
  
• A 12-member advisory board appointed by lawmakers and administration officials to oversee medical care, administration and family programs meant to support injured troops (Scully, CongressDaily, 3/21); and
  
  
• A program to test a more formal manner of transferring medical cases from the Department of Defense to the Department of Veterans Affairs.
  

The legislation would require the military to alert Congress whenever a soldier is placed in a medical facility from a combat zone, which would allow lawmakers to contact families and offer help. It also would commission several new reports from DoD, including a review of its system for rating disabilities, which soldiers contend underrates certain disabilities or claims they are unrelated to combat. Committee Chair Ike Skelton (D-Mo.), who sponsored the legislation, called the bill "our initial legislative response to address the most compelling of the issues that have emerged surrounding the treatment of wounded warriors at Walter Reed" (Wayne, CQ Today, 3/19). A floor vote on the legislation is expected in the next several weeks (CongressDaily, 3/21).

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