Recently, a number of veterans shared their experiences with Fox News, revealing how the Veterans Affairs medical facility in West Palm Beach, Florida, is restricting access to community providers that veterans are compelled to seek out due to the VA’s inability to meet their needs.
One such veteran is Michael Cohen, a 22-year Air Force veteran who sought assistance for emotional challenges stemming from his military service.
Cohen recounted his struggles in trying to see multiple VA therapists over the years, only to face difficulties in securing regular appointments.
As a result, he turned to private treatment through the VA’s community care program – designed for eligible veterans to receive care from outside providers when the VA’s services fall short.
However, the West Palm Beach VA Healthcare System has now halted approval for requests for community care, leaving many veterans without access to their trusted mental health providers who have supported them through their service to the nation.
Jessica Carillo, a former Air Force staff sergeant, receives primary care through the West Palm Beach VA.
“I got laid off last year in September, and I have not been able to pay for my psychiatrist that I used to pay out of pocket,” she told Fox News Digital. She said community care helped pay for her therapy, but the VA cut her off in January.
“I was in the middle of a big, big, big session. We just discovered some major things. And then, they left me in limbo,” Carillo said.
The facility falls in Congressman Brian Mast’s district (R-FL). Mast, a former Army bomb technician who lost both his legs and a finger in Afghanistan, said his office has been contacted by over 70 veterans, their relatives, and their mental health providers to raise concerns about the potentially devasting consequences of the VA’s decision.
“They are now being told, listen, everybody that you were seeing outside for your mental health care, you can’t do that anymore. You now have to come internal to the West Palm Beach VA hospital and get your mental health care there,” Mast said.
President Trump made community care permanent by signing the VA Mission Act in 2018. On May 13, 2024, Mast penned a letter to Denis McDonough, the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, and David Isaacks, the Network Director of VA Sunshine Healthcare Network, to raise his concerns and seek answers.
Secretary McDonough,
I am writing to you because I am concerned about the mental health of our veterans. In recent months, my office has been inundated with calls and emails from veterans upset about being denied access to their current community mental health physicians.
Veterans are reporting that the West Palm Beach VA Medical Center is refusing to authorize their requests to continue community-based care. In particular, veterans say the West Palm Beach VAMC will no longer cover referrals to outside mental health care providers.
This is a departure from a long-standing practice. For years, the Department of Veterans Affairs has allowed veterans to receive outside care because of an inability to retain adequate mental health professionals. This flexibility allowed veterans to escape the poor experiences they previously had within the VA’s network, including frequent last-minute cancellations for appointments to high-turnover rates among mental health staff.
Despite that troubling record, my office is now hearing that veterans are being denied·access to their preferred mental health care providers. As of January, we’ve been contacted by over 70 veterans, relatives, and mental health providers about this matter.
As a veteran who lost his legs in Afghanistan, this is extremely troubling to hear from my brothers and sisters in uniform. Like any individual, veterans do not want to lose access to their doctors, especially after having built trust and personal relationships over years of treatment. In the case of veterans battling post-traumatic stress, these disruptions could have irreparable damage and cause them to relapse.
It takes time for any individual, not just a veteran, to feel comfortable enough with a mental health provider to discuss their traumas and afflictions. By forcing these veterans away from their current providers against their wishes, the WPS VAMC would make veterans relive events and situations that have left them with deep wounds. This is not a risk we can afford to take given that the suicide rate among veterans remains unacceptably high and is on the rise.
I believe that veterans deserve the flexibility to choose from who and where they receive their mental health services. Veterans want to go where they are valued and respected. Unfortunately, the West Palm Beach VAMC, due to high turnover and inferior service, has not shown in the past that this is something it can provide.
The brave men and women who put on this country’s uniform should get the care they earned and deserve. I ask that you answer the following questions:
1. Why has the West Palm Beach VAMC begun denying veterans access to their outside mental health providers?
2. ls the recent surge in community care authorization refusals due to a change in policy within the VA?
3. If a veteran desires to remain with a community-care mental health provider, and their community provider supports continued treatment, will the VA honor that request?
4. In light of the documented shortage of mental health professionals within the VA system,
why does the department continue to restrict veterans’ access to community-based care where such professionals are more readily available?
5. How does the VA justify its denial of community-based mental health care to veterans, especially when it often results in prolonged wait times and exacerbation of their mental health conditions?
6. How does the VA reconcile its obligation to provide timely, effective, and comprehensive mental health care to veterans with its ongoing refusal to fully utilize community-based resources, which are often more accessible and responsive to veterans’ needs?
7. What steps is the VA taking to ensure that veterans who are unable to access timely mental health care within the VA system are promptly referred to and supported in obtaining care from community providers?
8. Given the growing recognition of the importance of holistic, community-integrated approaches to mental health care, why does the VA persist in maintaining policies that limit veterans’ access to the full spectrum of available resources, including community based services?
Please respond by May 20, 2024.
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7 Comments
It is not the VA fault as Joe Biden and His Democratic Administration has cut the funding for Community Care Service for outside help. That puts an overload back onto the VA and personal. This money was used to offset obamacare that was supposed to pay for itself, but continues to get funding to offset cost to enrollees. Make sure the story and article says the whole picture. You as a congressman should already know this. Thank you.
Just more proof the Biden regime could care less about Vets or seniors for that matter.
But free stuff galore for illegals on OUR dollars.
Amen to that and also a projected TRILLION plus dollars to pay for deadbeat student loans for upper middle class students, including paying off the debt for those that dropped out after a few years of “Animal House” activities.
Just more proof the Biden regime could care less about Vets or seniors for that matter.
But free stuff galore for illegals on OUR dollars. And sorry AI, I have not said this before.
One major problem with the mental health services offered at the VA is that many of both the doctors and psychologists that the patients are provided are residents or interns, and rotate every few months, meaning that every 3-4 months the veterans have to start back at ground zero with a therapist who knows nothing about them.
The va cut community outreach for us vets so they can send all the low life illegals there. Pedophile joe could care less about us vet along with most of the libturds. There are people in congress that don’t even know what Memorial Day is for,
I am a US Army Vet and served from 12/66-12/68. I was assigned to Fort Wolthers TX Army Primary Helicopter School in Mineral Wells TX. I was daily exposed to the departure and arrival of 1500 OH-23 Souix Helicopters departing in the morning, returning just before mid day, departing agian after refueling, and coming back at 4pm, some departing again for night flights. My barracks and work place was right under the direct flight path into and out of the main heliport. My hearing suffered, and I have tennitus. I went to Baylor Medical Center and they contributed my time there with my hearing probems today. I went to the VA and was met by 4 black receptionests who told me, “Your not getting anything” I had to practically beg to be seen and once the VA tested me they got the same results. In the VA opinion though it was not caused by my military service. Funny, hearing was great before, and no tennitus proven on earlier physicals. The VA is total Bull Crap, highly racist, and could care less about people. It is a place for, if you look around in them for non white people to screw over white veterans. Am I pissed, yes. I expect help not harassment. I went for help after that and met with the same result when I met up with another minority that gave me the same crap. I am not even asking for a disability, I am looking for help so that I can hear!