Disability Fraud

An assortment of complex issues has weakened the VA’s ability to deliver on its promise “to care for him who shall have borne the battle” (VA, 2015).

Medicaid fraud comes in many forms. A provider who bills Medicaid for services that he or she does not provide is committing fraud. Overstating the level of care provided to patients and altering patient records to conceal the deception is fraud. Recipients also commit fraud by failing to report or misrepresenting income, household members, residence, or private health insurance. Facilities have also been known to commit Medicaid fraud through false billing. The Medicare and Medicaid fraud and abuse statute provides that an individual who knowingly and willfully offers, pays, solicits, or receives any remuneration in exchange for referring an individual for the furnishing of any item or service

Dictionary.com’s definition of the Department of Veterans Affairs is, “The second-largest cabinet department, the VA coordinates the distribution of benefits for veterans of the American armed forces and their dependents. The benefits include compensation for disabilities, the management of veterans' hospitals, and various insurance programs.” My sister, Keara Torkelson, is a retired US Army Veteran. Every time she takes a trip to the VA’s office, she only comes out less and less satisfied. However, the VA’s office isn’t the only place Veterans are neglected.

They claimed Iraq and Afghanistan veteran polls have been taken, it shows that whatever improvements and actions being were taken were not enough. Fifty-nine percent of the people rated the job the government was doing to help was good, while fifty-six percent rated it as them doing poorly. In an article by CNN news nineteen veterans have died because of delays for medical treatments from the Veterans Affair. Those nineteen veterans were only a small proportion of that group. A number of eight-two veterans who have died because of delays for medical treatments like colonoscopies or endoscopies. Some people like my father (Jason McLain), who is a retired veteran, believes that some doctors have their own personal bias toward veterans. Jason McLain stated, “When I go to the VA they do not help me as soon as I need their help. Although when I go to any other civilian doctor’s office they help me right away with any of their help”. A website by the name of Free Grants Community stated that success and failures of the Departments of Veterans Affair are frequently the subjects of political promises and debates. There are many places that can help with benefits or homelessness, simply anything veteran(active/retired) need. A six-year veteran stated that there are places to help but emphasizes that you have to pursue yourself. After you are done with the military to go back to school and to keep getting educated. Besides the fact the regular ordinary citizens complain that veterans are not getting enough help, there have been complaints against all employers for discrimination has blames the economic crisis and ballooning deficits for the inability to provide for more

The VA System needs a complete over all we are doing a terrible disservices to our veteran’s.

The main research questions in this study are: 1) is veteran healthcare equal to private healthcare; 2) do veterans have to wait longer for treatment options; and 3) do veterans have limited treatment options? It is hypothesized that veterans receive inferior healthcare services compared to private healthcare and the community is unaware of the disparities.

The Department of Veteran’s Affairs (VA) has been tasked with providing support and benefits to Veterans after they have completed their service. However, many Veterans are reporting difficulty accessing care due to systematic barriers within the VA’s Veterans Health Administration (Oliver, 2007). Complex eligibility requirements, long wait lists and lack of providers are a few of the issues Veterans are faced with when trying to access health and mental health care. Additionally, studies indicate that veterans, predominantly those from the recent wars in Iran and Iraq, have disproportionately high amounts of mental illness (Shim & Rust, 2013). These same veterans are experiencing difficulty accessing mental health care due to issues around a backlog of healthcare eligibility applications and a shortage of mental health providers through the Veterans Health Administration (VHA), which operates the Nation’s largest, integrated health care delivery system (APA, 2014). In 2014, at the request of the Chairman of the U.S. House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, the VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) evaluated the merit of the allegations of mismanagement at the Veterans Health Administration’s (VHA) and the Health Eligibility Center (HEC).

In the past few years there has been increasing discussion about how to provide adequate care for the increasing number of veterasn who are eligible for care through the Veterans’ healthcare administration (VHA). There are concerns is that the VHA is not providing the level of access, efficiency, and quality of care that veterans expect. Lee & Begley, (2016) suggest access to care for the veteran population may be resulting in poor health outcomes. In response to these concerns, the Veterans ' Access to Care through Choice, Accountability, and Transparency Act (VACAA) of 2014, also known as the Veterans Choice Act, was created to improve Veterans’ healthcare. The VACAA proposed to do this by expanding the number of options veterans have for receiving healthcare, by providing access for healthcare at non-VA care centers as well as providing for an increase in staffing at VA facilities (U. S. Department of Veterans Affairs, 2016).

Over the past 15 years, the Veterans Benefits Administration (VBA) has seen a dramatic increase in the average degree of disability, growth in the number of compensation recipients, a rise in the number of medical issues claimed and an increased level of complexity of claimed issues. To illustrate this point, prior to the September 2011 terrorist attacks, 333,700 Veterans received compensation at the 70-100 percent level; however, these figures rose to over 1.1 million by the end of 2013. Additionally, since 2009, VA’s disability compensation workload rose 132 percent. This is in large part due to an unprecedented demand resulting from over a decade of war, military downsizing, economic issues, increased outreach, the addition of presumptive conditions and an aging Veteran population.

Current funding for veteran healthcare care is low and insufficient because of the large number of veterans, who are being discharged from the military as the country transitions to a democratic President. According to Dr. Rachel Nardin in her article about veteran healthcare, “Soldiers get excellent acute care when injured on active duty, but as revelations of poor conditions for soldiers receiving ongoing outpatient care at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center highlighted, service members often have trouble getting the care they need once active duty ends” (Nardin 1)

Veterans are being cheated out of their time, money, and resources while waiting for benefits from claims that are waiting to be processed. In the article, "Veterans Face Long Delays for Disability Claims" it states, "while veterans waited longer than ever in recent time for their wartime disability compensation, the Department of Veterans Affairs gave its workers millions

An ex-military veteran, Sgt. Bradie Frink, lost his job for 26 months due to the fact that the VA thought he was trying to blow the whistle on them. Bradie, who served our country, was only trying to change his beneficiary policy so that both of his children would benefit from it. The VA has been under scrutiny for not providing benefits guaranteed to many of our ex-military personnel. These whistleblowers were then quickly unemployed due to the attention they brought on the VA.

Some problems I discovered while doing my research are that many Veterans don't receive proper medical care and it is often hard for them to find. They are not automatically enrolled in Va benefits when they return home and have to apply for them. Those that have access to benefits often find themselves on waiting lists to receive benefits.

The assignment being completed within this report asks the author of said report to answer to a few analysis and review questions pertaining to the Veteran Affairs Administration in the United States, especially as it pertains to their claims processing dilemmas and issues. The author, in order, is asked to analyze the organizational design of the Veterans Administration, analyze the agency's global and international linkages, analyze their human resource goals and frameworks, analyze their training programs and offer two actions the agency can undertake to attract and maintain a qualified workforce. The author is asked to provide five relevant and credible outside sources outside of the sources that support this assignment's content.

Contrary to the perception that our nation’s veterans are well supported in fact many go without the services they require of which they are