A Walter Reed Medical Center Update

Back in early March, I was one of the earliest writers to report on the horrible treatment of our injured veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan to the Walter Reed Army Medical Center. Based on the many internal investigations at Walter Reed that have been in process, I decided to revisit the situation to see what has been done to correct the problems at the medical center. At this point, I must say that there have been many improvements, but the investigations have also turned up some continuing issues that have even more negative effects than those of the original problems.

History: The IAP / Walter Reed Contract:

The original out-sourc contractor for Walter Reed was International American Products, Inc. (IAP). This is the same contractor chosen to deliver ice in New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. Their trucks were responsible for what became known as the "FEMA Ice Follies Fiasco". They delivered very little ice and cost the US tax payers tens of thousands of dollars. As with most situations during the previous Republican led congress, there had been no over sight of most sub-contractor’s services.

Management of IAP is currently in the hands of Mr. Al Neffgen and Mr. David Swindle. Both of these individuals were previously former executives of a Halliburton subsidiary; Kellogg, Brown & Root (KBR), a giant of a military outsourcing company. (KBR is currently under allegations of overcharging the government for their services.) IAP also has contracts with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers for providing 4 wheel drive vehicles and cell phones at US Military Camp Doha in Kuwait and they are supplying power supplies and support in Afghanistan and Iraq. This is only a small list of IAP's total business w/ the US Military.

The Army originally awarded IAP a contract for $120 Million for administrative, managerial and operational services at Walter Reed. In October 2006, a Walter Reed commander had warned of a "possible mission failure" at the medical center. Skilled government workers were leaving in droves as the workload of wounded vets increased to an overwhelming level. Henry Waxman - D-Calif, Chairman of the House Government Oversight Committee has said: "IAP didn't do a good job delivering ice and from what we now see, they didn't do a very good job at Walter Reed either."

• Author’s note:

Since my article last March, I have received multiple inputs from previous IAP employees. They confirmed the poor service from IAP in other US locations and a number of employees left IAP due to their low pay, poor management and the lack of quality service and professionalism. This was specifically for IAP’s irregular accounting procedures and IAP’s poor culinary service for their US Navy contract.

The IAP Navy contract was eventually terminated due to IAP’s sub-standard service and they were replaced by ASA, the primary contractor.

Recent Changes:

Fortunately, the congress (not the Bush administration) has seen the light and the IAP contract at Walter Reed has been terminated. It began transitioning; starting in August 2007, back over to government employees. The transition is expected to be completed by November.

Other Key Improvements at Walter Reed:

General Richard Coty, US Army Vice Chief of Staff, has taken on the responsibility for Walter Reed to provide accountability, responsibility and leadership for fixing the problems.

Recommendations are being made and implemented for reducing and streamlining the bureaucracy, training and organization at Walter Reed.

Wounded Soldiers have been relocated out of the substandard Building 18 and the building upgrade is in process.

A full-service SOLDIER & FAMILY ASSISTANCE CENTER has been created to consolidate seven independent in-process centers down to two.

Family members traveling to Washington DC to visit a wounded soldier are now met upon arrival by a soldier in uniform and escorted to the center.

Patient backlogs have been eliminated.

Trained ombudsmen are now on staff at Walter Reed’s Patient Representative Office.

Wounded US Soldiers are now measured for new uniforms upon arrival at the center and are delivered to them ASAP. (Wounded may arrive in only a hospital gown.)

An Army Inspector General will review Walter Reed every 6 months to collect soldier and family feed-back on simplified forms.

General Cody will meet with hospital commanders every 4-6 weeks to ensure all needed changes are made.

The Pentagon has formed a committee to oversee the Walter Reed repairs.

What the investigations also uncovered:

The first major area that became apparent was that all the problems were not just at Walter Reed.

During a Senate hearing last March with the Army Surgeon General, Kevin Kiley, US Senator Patty Murray (D-Washington State) stated that “From what I’m hearing, Walter Reed is just the tip of the ice berg.” Senator Murray was referring to recent reports of similar problems at the Madigan Army Medical Center located at Fort Lewis, Wash. (The West Coast version of Walter Reed.) The report said that soldiers were languishing in medical “hold” units, sometimes for over a year, therefore, not receiving the needed care in a timely fashion. The military medical teams were also found to be falsely issuing low disability ratings just to save money for the Army. She continued to state that: “The Pentagon is failing our service members at exactly the time they need the most support. This is shameful and unacceptable.”

Senator Murray also told the General: “We can’t get to the bottom of this, and we can’t do our job unless we know exactly what’s going on out there. I want your personal assurance that no soldier who blows the whistle on substandard care will be retaliated against.”

General Kiley responded saying: “You have my word. I share your concern and we certainly want them to talk openly to us.”

Here are the details that came from subsequent hearings:

Soldiers at the US Army Medical Centers were being found to languish for up to two years in medical “hold” units.

Soldiers were being hurried out of the Department of Defense and into the Veteran’s hospitals before they received the surgery they needed. (DoD and US Veterans are NOT under the same annual US budgets. The quicker they leave the DoD and become military vets, the less the DoD has to pay for veteran’s care.)

US soldiers were falsely being given low disability ratings that don’t reflect their actual injuries. This allows the Army to deny them disability coverage.

US Soldiers were and are being misdiagnosed as having a pre-existing disease or mental problem, allowing them to be discharged without any medical coverage. This includes soldiers w/ Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) that are being told that they had PTSD before they enlisted...?

There is now proof that some US military personnel have been discharged because they have a 50-50 hereditary condition that might eventually come to pass. As an example, a 25 year old soldier that, due to his father's Huntingtons Disease the soldier had a 50-50 chance of getting Huntingtons Disease in the future. He was discharged for this problem even though it will probably be another 25 years before he shows any symptoms.

It’s bad enough that our volunteer military has been sent into the middle of a civil war and to manage an illegal US military occupation. It’s totally disgusting that the US government is trying to cut corners when dealing with those American “volunteers” that have gambled with the ultimate sacrifice. Once again, an initial lack of proper planning and over sight of our active military has brought more disgrace to a great nation’s treatment of its military wounded.