Warrior Transition Unit Leaders Had to Be Ordered to Treat Wounded Better?

UPDATE FROM DALLAS MORNING NEWS
Army orders new training for Warrior Transition Units

Sen. John Cornyn, in a strongly worded letter to Secretary of the Army John McHugh, said he found “highly disturbing” complaints about verbal abuse, disrespect and unfair treatment within the Army’s Warrior Transition Units, or WTUs.

The complaints were gathered from interviews with current and former soldiers, as well as hundreds of military records obtained by The News and NBC5 through the Freedom of Information Act.

“These news reports indicate a need for increased congressional oversight. Moreover, they raise a number of serious policy questions,” Cornyn wrote in the letter dated Monday.

“The purpose of these WTUs is to help soldiers heal and recover from physical and psychological wounds of war and then either return to their units or transition to civilian life,” he wrote. “Yet, the environment described in the recent news reports ... falls far short of that standard.”

Cornyn’s points

In his letter, Cornyn raised several questions:

Has there been a hostile climate within the WTUs?

Within the WTUs, do key personnel understand post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, and recognize it as a legitimate medical condition?

Does the organizational structure of the WTUs result in friction between military requirements and medical needs of soldiers?

Has the Army implemented recommendations from the Department of Defense Inspector General to improve training of the WTU leaders?

Are pharmaceuticals being overused as a treatment for wounded soldiers with PTSD or other psychological ailments?

The answer is yes. We've known about it, screamed about it, cried about it and members of Congress didn't listen.

Army had to issue orders at every Warrior Transition Unit to treat wounded with "dignity and respect." Top that off with they think that a day of training leaders will make enough of a difference to stop the widespread abuse of our wounded. Do they really think a day is enough to undo all this?

It was created 7 years ago. Think about that. For the last 7 years when we were told a totally different story about the care the wounded were getting and how serious the leaders were on addressing PTSD, this was happening. It took NBC news and the Dallas Morning News 6 months to uncover what we've all been talking about and now, finally, something may be done. If you want to know why there are so many suicides, this is a huge part of the reason.

I am very thankful for NBC and Dallas Morning News for uncovering this wide spread abuse of our wounded soldiers.

The best part is now members of Congress are paying attention to this too. Gee do you think they should have done some investigating on their own if they really cared about saving soldiers and veterans? Do you think they should have been paying attention to what all of us knew instead of passing bills to prevent suicides when the answer was already known to most of us?

It all starts with the bullshit of what the DOD has been doing to the soldiers instead of what they claimed they were doing for them!

Army officials order new training to address complaints made by injured soldiers highlighted in an NBC 5 Investigates report. NBC 5 Dallas By Scott Friedman Dec 17, 2014

Army Takes Action on Warrior Transition Units
Injured Heroes, Broken Promises: Army Orders New Training at Warrior Transition Units
NBC 5 report prompts Congressional action on harassment in the Army
By Scott Friedman
December 17, 2014

The training was to be specifically focused on how to treat soldiers with dignity and respect.

“So harassment and abuse is unacceptable in our force.” said Army Warrior Transition Commander, Col. Chris Toner, in an interview last month.

“The message is you can't mistreat these soldiers. The message is you will treat them with dignity and respect,” said Toner.

The investigation showed soldiers with post-traumatic stress describe WTU army leaders cursing at them and telling to get over it.

Spc. Michael Howard said he was told to “man up” while in recovery at a WTU. Other soldiers complained of being ordered to drive to early-morning military formations while being prescribed sedating medications during their treatment.

“On one occasion, I fell asleep at a stoplight with my vehicle in drive,” said Sgt. Zach Filip.

Now Thornberry and Cornyn are calling on the Army to do more to address the allegations uncovered.

"I think it's very concerning,” said Thornberry, the new Chairman-Elect of the House Armed Services Committee.

He said as far back as 2008 the committee saw similar concerns from soldiers and demanded improvement from the Army.

Changes can’t come soon enough for Robin Howard, whose husband Michael Howard was at the WTU at Fort Hood until he retired earlier this year. Michael said commanders left him feeling verbally abused and threatened while receiving treatment for post-traumatic stress and a degenerative brain condition.

“These are real humans they've mistreated,” said Robin Howard.

The Howard’s hope Army leaders will take the new training that’s been ordered to heart.

“I'm hoping that it's more than lip service. I'm hoping they are going to make these changes. The soldiers need this,” said Robin Howard.

The new Army training orders specifically tells commanders care plans for the injured should be, “tailored to the soldier and family.” read more here

They've been getting complaints going back to 2008, yet when suicides went up, they didn't bother to figure out why.

Well meaning push for bill pushes PTSD facts out

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
December 17, 2014

Veterans and families are tired of waiting and wondering when reporters will talk about what we see on this side of the issues.

Sometimes I don't know if I will ever find the right words for people to finally get it. The troops do. The veterans do. The trouble is, well meaning folks online don't. They are trying. They are searching. They are reaching out and many are praying for answers. Trust me. If we keep settling for better than nothing the troops and veterans will be able to depend on the same old nothing they've been getting all along.

I've had a lot of discussions over the years but while the veterans community, at least most of us in it, totally understand where the failures began leading us to where we are, too many others believe whatever they are told.

I think the IAVA is great and means well by pushing the Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention Bill.

Shown Here:
Introduced in House (07/10/2014)

Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for American Veterans Act or the Clay Hunt SAV Act - Requires the Secretary of Veterans Affairs (VA) and the Secretary of Defense (DOD), at least annually, to each arrange for an independent third party evaluation of, respectively, the VA and DOD mental health care and suicide prevention programs.

Requires a board reviewing the discharge or dismissal of a former member of the Armed Forces whose application for relief is based at least in part on post-traumatic stress disorder or traumatic brain injury related to military operations or sexual trauma, to:
(1) review the medical evidence from the VA or a civilian health provider that is presented by the former member; and
(2) review the case, with a presumption of administrative irregularity, and place the burden on the VA or DOD to prove, by a preponderance of the evidence, that no error or injustice occurred.

Directs the VA Secretary to publish an Internet website that serves as a centralized source to provide veterans with regularly updated information regarding all of the VA's mental health care services.

Requires the VA Secretary and the DOD Secretary to enter into certain strategic relationships to facilitate: the mental health referrals of members of the reserve components who have a service-connected disability and are being discharged or released from the Armed Forces,
timely behavioral health services for such members,
communication when such members are at risk for behavioral health reasons, and
the transfer of documentation for line-of-duty and fitness-for-duty determinations.

Requires the VA Secretary to carry out a three-year pilot program to repay the education loans relating to psychiatric medicine that are incurred by individuals who: are eligible to practice psychiatric medicine in the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) or are enrolled in the final year of a residency program leading to a specialty qualification in psychiatric medicine,
demonstrate a commitment to a long-term career as a psychiatrist in the VHA, and
agree to a period of obligated service with the VHA in the field of psychiatric medicine.

Directs the VA Secretary to carry out a program, as part of the Yellow Ribbon G.I. Education Enhancement Program, under which the VA Secretary and an institution of higher education (IHE) agree to cover the full cost of charges not covered by post-9/11 educational assistance that are incurred by veterans who: (1) are pursuing an advanced degree in mental health at the IHE, and (2) intend to seek employment as a mental health professional in the VA. Allows the VA Secretary to cover up to 64% of those charges, if the school covers the remainder.

Requires the DOD Secretary to submit to Congress a zero-based review of the staffing requirements for individual State National Guard Commands with respect to Directors of Psychological Health.

Directs the VA Secretary to establish a pilot program at not less than five Veterans Integrated Service Networks (VISNs) to assist veterans transitioning from active duty and to improve the access of veterans to mental health services. Requires the pilot program at each VISN to include: (1) a community oriented veteran peer support network, and (2) a community outreach team for each medical center in such VISN.

They mean well however there is nothing new in this bill that hasn't been done before.

It isn't as if no one knew it has been happening. They just didn't know what to do about saving lives so they tried anything and everything.

Suicides Seen Among Vets Treated By VA
CBS News March 20, 2008
According to the experts, two age groups stood out between 2000 and 2007. First, ages 20-24 - those likely to have served during the Iraq-Afghan wars. Suicide attempts rose from 11 to 47.

And for vets ages 55 to 59, suicide attempts jumped from 19 to 117.

In both age groups, the attempted suicides grew at a rate much faster than the VA patient population as a whole.

In addition, this VA study, also obtained exclusively by CBS News, reveals the increasing number of veterans who recently received VA services ... and still succeeded in committing suicide: rising from 1,403 suicides in 2001 to 1,784 in 2005 - figures the VA has never made public.

But even that turned out to be wrong considering a lawsuit filed by Veterans For Common Sense produced documents showing the VA knew they had 1,000 veterans attempted suicides every month

But in this e-mail to his top media adviser, written two months ago, Katz appears to be saying something very different, stating: "Our suicide prevention coordinators are identifying about 1,000 suicide attempts per month among veterans we see in our medical facilities."

Katz's e-mail was written shortly after the VA provided CBS News data showing there were only 790 attempted suicides in all 2007 - a fraction of Katz's estimate.

"This 12,000 attempted suicides per year shows clearly, without a doubt, that there is an epidemic of suicide among veterans," said Paul Sullivan of Veterans for Common Sense.

This is why veterans cannot wait for another bill to do the same as every other bill has done. They cannot wait for someone to wake up to the fact that these struggles begin in the military and so far, the toxic leadership has done a great job feeding the stigma between their "resilience training" the abuse of soldiers in Warrior Transition Units, and then all of this topped off with bad conduct discharges by the thousands a year in each branch. The Army discharged 11,000 in 2013 alone.

The reporters told us that the DOD is doing pre and post deployment screenings however the Joint Vice Chiefs of Staff told the Senate Armed Services Committee they were not doing post deployment screenings.

Reporters told us that the majority of the suicides were committed by soldiers that had never been deployed yet they never asked how they expect resilience training to work on multiple deployed troops if it didn't even work on the non-deployed.

Reporters told us that the number of suicides went down but reporters didn't bother to also mention the fact that so did the number of enlisted personnel.

Reporters told us that families were being trained and taught about PTSD, but families say they didn't have a clue and no one told them anything.

Reporters told us that Comprehensive Soldier Fitness costs about $125 million but didn't bother to mention the fact that was just a down payment for a research project designed to give school aged kids a better sense of self-worth and experts said it didn't fit with military culture topping off the fact resilience cannot be taught.

There are a lot of things the general public is led to believe but the reality we live with everyday is much different.

Problems in the VA are not new and they have been going on for decades. I know because my Dad was a 100% followed by my husband. So I've been exposed to the issues all my life.

The VA has been accused of being a pill-mill and rightly so for the most part even though pills only numb and do not heal. Peer support groups work best for veterans and for the families but they are not supported across the country. It all still depends on where a veteran lives how much they are helped or harmed.

Healing PTSD requires a three level approach treating the mind-body-spirit of the veteran and this has been known for 40 years.

The families are on the front lines and knowledge or lack of it contributes to the outcomes.

There is so much reporters are not telling the citizens so when things happen like the murders in Pennsylvania, they jump to the conclusion veterans with PTSD are dangerous without ever thinking about how few reports they read like that but how many they read about a veteran harming themselves instead.

They are not reminded of the simple fact that there are over 7 million people in this country living with PTSD but not many of them are dangerous to anyone but themselves in the general population.

There are many things that can be done and have been done proven to work yet when we are willing to settle for anything, these other things are ignored, history is repeated while veterans wait for a different outcome.

There were less suicides when less was being done and that, that is the thing reporters should have been telling folks all along because frankly, it is what we live with year after year.

One more thing we're tired of is when this generation of veterans gets pushed up so they get more benefits than older veterans do. Either we take care of all veterans now equally or when this generation takes over as the "old guys" they'll be pushed back too. I doubt they'd like it very much.

"Toxic Command Climate" Linked to Sailor's Suicide

Report: Bullying, Abuse Contributed to Sailor's Suicide
The Virginian-Pilot
by Dianna Cahn
Dec 16, 2014

A sailor's suicide on board the Norfolk-based destroyer James E. Williams in June can be blamed in part on a toxic command climate that involved bullying and reprisal, a command investigation has found.

The investigation was spurred by the death of the sailor but grew in scope when investigators began examining the ship's leadership. What they found was misconduct and abusive behavior among the senior enlisted while the commanding officer and the executive officer failed to take charge.

Among the allegations to surface in the report were accounts of sexual assault, a reprisal and unruly alcohol abuse by the ship's command master chief -- the top enlisted officer.

The ship's skipper, Cmdr. Curtis Calloway, handed over the reins in September in a scheduled change of command. He was reassigned, along with his deputy, Cmdr. Ed Handley, and Command Master Chief Travis Biswell, to a desk job in Norfolk pending the investigation. All three faced non-judicial punishment for dereliction of duty in October, while Biswell was also found guilty of drunk and disorderly conduct.
read more here

Military Commissary Shoppers used $130.6 million in food stamps 2013

Just wanted to share this in case you didn't care when food stamps were cut and didn't know many of the people on them are in the military and veterans.

Food Stamp, WIC, Debit Terminals Down at Many Commissaries
Military.com
by Amy Bushatz
Dec 16, 2014

Commissary shoppers used $130.6 million in food stamps, officially known as the Supplement Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), in fiscal 2013, the most recent year for which data is available, according to the Defense Department. About $29 million in WIC benefits were redeemed that same year.

Some stateside commissaries are unable to process food stamps, and some WIC and debit card payments after the security certificate in store PIN pad terminals expired Dec. 7, shutting down the system.

The problem, which was not a data security breach and did not put any patron payment information at risk, impacted Defense Commissary Agency stores as well as some civilian grocers across the U.S., officials said.

"On December 7 thousands of older model PIN pads produced by Hypercom were unable to process debit card, EBT and electronic WIC transactions because the terminals' cryptographic certificate expired," Kevin Robinson, a DeCA spokesman, said in a statement. "As of Dec. 14, approximately 60 percent of DeCA's total PIN pads are able to process all of our customer's electronic transactions requiring a PIN."

The problem has the biggest impact on commissary shoppers who want to use electronic benefits transfer (EBT) food stamp benefits.

Stores where terminals are down can still run debit cards as credit cards, but are unable to give cash back. They can also process Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) transactions on paper. However, patrons who want to use food stamp benefits will need to do so at a different store or wait until the system is repaired.
read more here

500 Fort Irwin Soldiers March 38 Miles to Honor Veterans

SOLDIERS MARCH 38 MILES TO SPREAD HOLIDAY CHEER TO BARSTOW VETERANS
ABC 7 News
By Rob McMillan
Tuesday, December 16, 2014

BARSTOW, Calif. (KABC) -- About 500 soldiers marched 38 miles from their base in Fort Irwin to the California Veterans Home in Barstow as part of an annual tradition to spread holiday cheer to our nation's heroes.

Through rain or shine, the 11th Armored Cavalry Regiment spent two days marching. When they arrived, more than 160 veterans greeted them.

"Everybody here is a veteran and to see this kind of acknowledgement is really good," Vietnam veteran Jim Wilson said.
read more here