Naval Hospital becomes training ground for program improvement

Naval Hospital becomes training ground for program improvement
January 25, 2012 10:40 AM
HOPE HODGE - DAILY NEWS STAFF
In October 2010, Camp Lejeune Naval Hospital was the worst in the Navy at returning findings for service members sidelined by wounds, injury or illness in a timely manner. A little more than a year later, officials from distant Marine Corps bases and even other services pay visits to the hospital to learn how to improve their own programs.

All it took, Lt. j.g. Lisa Cook said, was a number of sleepless nights and a different way of seeing things.

The process for wounded, ill, or injured troops deemed potentially unfit for further service is supposed to take a Congress-mandated 295 days from injury to military separation or re-joining a unit. The Camp Lejeune Naval Hospital, like other Navy medical centers, is responsible for 100 of those days: the time it takes to complete a service member’s physical exam and complete medical records and findings so that the service member can continue to receive a VA rating and transition to civilian life or begin re-integration into full-time service. And with the high rate of deployment of Camp Lejeune troops, the Naval Hospital processed 1,200 of these medical boards last year, more than any other naval medical center, including larger centers such as Camp Pendleton and Portsmouth.

Cook, the department head for Patient Administration, arrived at her post a year ago to find a staggering mess. In the office were 989 patient files, each representing a Marine or sailor waiting idle on base while his or her findings were completed. The oldest file was dated 2008.

“They’re in limbo; they don’t know if they can move on with their life, or they’re just sitting around,” Cook said. “You don’t know. ‘Do we move my spouse back home while I wait for my findings; do I not?’ We had members being told ‘This process is going to take 295 days and you’re going to be out,’ and they moved their spouse away so they could just sit here and relax and get better, but a year and a half later, they still have no findings.”
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Good Samaritan killed while helping motorist on I-4

Good Samaritan killed while helping motorist on I-4
The victim has not been identified, according to the Florida Highway Patrol.
By Arelis R. Hernández, Orlando Sentinel
12:26 p.m. EST, January 26, 2012

A man who was helping another motorist on the side of westbound Interstate 4 in Volusia County was fatally struck by a passing vehicle early Thursday, the Florida Highway Patrol said. The unidentified victim pulled over to help Tiffany Walters, 23, who properly parked her Landrover sport-utility vehicle on the right shoulder near Mile Marker 115 in Lake Helen after she ran out of gas, said FHP Sgt. Kim Montes.
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557,460 wait more than 125 days for VA claims

VA sees 'paperless' claims as critical to ending backlog
By TOM PHILPOTT
Special to Stars and Stripes
Published: January 26, 2012
The only way to achieve VA Secretary Eric Shinseki’s goal for 2015 -- that every disability compensation claim gets processed within 125 days and with 98 percent accuracy -- is to shift to a paperless claims system. And that transformation has begun.

That was the testimony Tuesday by VA’s top claim processing official before the House veteran affairs’ subcommittee on disability assistance.

Tom Murphy, director of compensation service for the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA), an agency for the Department of Veterans Affairs, acknowledged the claims backlog has grown in recent years.

Compensation and benefit claims pending at VA, as of Jan. 23, totaled 852,127 and 65 percent of them – 557,460 – had been filed by veterans more than 125 days ago, which means they are in “backlog” status.
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Big cuts coming; lower pay raises start in 2015

Big cuts coming; lower pay raises start in 2015
By Andrew Tilghman and Rick Maze - Staff writers
Posted : Thursday Jan 26, 2012 14:00:23 EST
Service members can expect standard pay raises for the next two years — most likely 1.7 percent for 2013 — but that will change starting in 2015, according to a new budget plan unveiled at the Pentagon on Thursday.

Defense Secretary Leon Panetta released details of the 2013 budget, the first since Congress ordered the Pentagon to slash more than $450 billion in planned spending over the next decade, with a few glimpses of what may be in store beyond 2013.

Under the plan, military pay will continue to rise in tandem with the average annual increase in private-sector wages, but starting in 2015, raises may be capped a level slightly below annual growth in civilian pay.
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Former Marine pleads to military shootings

Former Marine pleads to military shootings
By Matthew Barakat - The Associated Press
Posted : Thursday Jan 26, 2012 12:27:11 EST
ALEXANDRIA, Va. — A former Marine from Virginia pleaded guilty Thursday and has agreed to serve a 25-year prison sentence on charges that he fired a series of overnight pot shots in 2010 at the Pentagon, the Marine Corps museum in Quantico and other military targets as part of what prosecutors called a campaign to strike fear throughout the region.

Prosecutors also revealed Thursday new details about Yonathan Melaku’s intended next target: Arlington National Cemetery, where he was arrested before he was able to carry out a plan to deface gravestones there.

As part of Thursday’s plea deal, Melaku, 24, of Alexandria, pleaded guilty to destruction of U.S. property, use of a firearm in an act of violence and intention to injure a veterans’ memorial, namely the cemetery. Prosecutors and Melaku’s lawyer agreed to a 25-year sentence as part of the deal, and U.S. District Judge Gerald Bruce Lee said he would agree to the sentence as well. But formal sentencing was delayed until April so a pre-sentence report can be prepared and Melaku’s lawyer can request a mental-health evaluation for his client.
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