Navy Vet gets claims letter addressed to another veteran

Navy vet worries Bay Pines 'typo' confuses him with another veteran

By William R. Levesque, Times Staff Writer
In Print: Monday, February 7, 2011
ST. PETERSBURG — Navy veteran Thomas Calahan never claimed he suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder.

And a doctor has never diagnosed him with PTSD, either.

After all, Calahan did not experienced the crucible of combat.

So it was with some surprise that Calahan, 60, recently opened a letter from the Department of Veterans Affairs and read that the VA wanted to discuss a medical claim he had filed.

It wanted to discuss his PTSD.

Then Calahan noticed the name atop the letter. It wasn't his.

In what Calahan said may be an odd breach of patient privacy, the St. Petersburg man thinks the VA mistakenly sent him information on another veteran's PTSD.

And he wonders if that man, in turn, got medical information about Calahan.

VA officials say that did not happen and patient privacy was not violated.

The letter was intended for Calahan, even if he does not have PTSD, the VA says.

"That doesn't make sense to me," Calahan said. "Why can't they keep this stuff straight?"

Critics have hammered the VA over breaches of patient privacy through the years, from boxes of records found on street curbs to stolen computers with data on millions of veterans.

Veterans file a million medical claims a year nationally.

"In the rush to process a huge backlog of claims, VA does make mistakes in claim decisions and other areas of veterans' claims," said Paul Sullivan, executive director of Veterans for Common Sense, an advocacy group.

His group has urged the VA to hire more employees to handle the high volume of claims.
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Navy vet worries