John McCain, Crypt Keeper of VA

There so much BS in this that it came close to making my head explode!

Senate passes bill on private veterans' care
USA TODAY
Kelly Kennedy
June 12, 2014

WASHINGTON — The Senate passed a bill Wednesday that would allow veterans to seek care from private providers if they face long wait times at Veterans Affairs facilities.

A similar bill passed the House Tuesday. Both Republicans and Democrats praised Congress's fast action on the issue.

The legislation would allow veterans to go to civilian doctors for the next two years if they live more than 40 miles from a VA treatment center or if they have been waiting more than 30 days for an appointment. It also provides funding for more health providers in the VA system.

It also allows those who do their jobs badly to be fired immediately, as well as an expedited appeals process.

Why didn't anyone ask them why they think it would do any good now since they have been doing exactly that for years?

What GAO Found

The Department of Veterans Affairs' (VA) fee basis care spending increased from about $3.04 billion in fiscal year 2008 to about $4.48 billion in fiscal year 2012. The slight decrease in fiscal year 2012 spending from the fiscal year 2011 level was due to VA's adoption of Medicare rates as its primary payment method for fee basis providers.

VA's fee basis care utilization also increased from about 821,000 veterans in fiscal year 2008 to about 976,000 veterans in fiscal year 2012.

GAO found that several factors affect VA medical centers' (VAMC) utilization of fee basis care--including veteran travel distances to VAMCs and goals for the maximum amount of time veterans should wait for VAMC-based appointments. VAMCs that GAO reviewed reported that they often use fee basis care to provide veterans with treatment closer to their homes--particularly for veterans who are not eligible for travel reimbursement. In addition, VAMC officials reported that veterans are often referred to fee basis providers to ensure that VAMC-based clinics that would otherwise treat them can meet established VA wait time goals for how long veterans wait for an appointment. However, GAO found that VA has not established goals for and does not track how long veterans wait to be seen by fee basis providers.

VA's monitoring of fee basis care spending is limited because fee basis data do not currently include a claim number or other identifier that allows all charges from a single office visit with a fee basis provider or an inpatient hospital stay to be analyzed together. GAO found that without the ability to analyze spending in this way, VA is limited in its ability to assess the cost of fee basis care and verify that fee basis providers were paid appropriately.

This is just more of the same veterans have had to suffer from all this time. Are there any honest reporters out there? Any left actually caring about our veterans to tell the truth?