Veterans face rare health risks, VA administrators told at forum

FAYETTEVILLE -- The long-term effects of breathing radioactive gas given off by nuclear warheads is an example of knowledge even a well-trained doctor may not have, local veterans affairs administrators were told Monday.

Administrators for the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and for the Veterans Health Care System of the Ozarks held a public question-and-answer forum Monday at the veterans hospital in Fayetteville. The system oversees the hospital and related clinics. Monday's forum was part of an effort to improve care after long waiting times for veterans and other issues nationwide came to light last year, forum organizers said.

Clay Cooper of Goshen, a businessman and Air Force veteran, raised the issue of some veterans' long-term exposure to exotic material. The hospital has an industrial hygienist on staff who advises in such cases, administrators told the crowd of at least 25 who attended.

While agreeing, Cooper said family practice physicians are the gatekeepers to specialized care. They have to make a diagnosis or at least suspect a highly unusual after-effect before an expert is called in, he said. He wasn't criticizing the doctors affiliated with the hospital, Cooper said, because a variety of such highly specialized health risks aren't well known even among experts. The department needs to do more to inform doctors of these unusual cases, he said.

Dr. Mark Worley, interim director of the Ozarks system, then invited Cooper to join the system's advisory board. Cooper accepted.

Among other issues, individual veterans brought up particulars of their cases and were referred to staff at the forum. One veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan said he was sent home without treatment from the veteran's hospital's emergency room, among other problems. Administrators said they would examine his case.

James Fales of Cane Hill was declared deceased and had a letter of condolence sent to his wife in January. This resulted from a clerical error involving a veteran in another state with the same name, said Lisa Breun, director of the veteran's department regional office in Little Rock. Breun apologized to Fales.

One veteran also said the department's decision to rely on the U.S. Postal Service to deliver prescription medicines to veterans was causing delays and gaps in delivery. The department used to offer the option of delivery by a private parcel service, he said.

Cooper is co-owner of Trinity Medical Billing of Fayetteville. He became aware of issues affecting missile crews because his father worked in a Titan II missile silo, Cooper said after the meeting. His father experienced medical problems and discovered fellow veterans with other problems, Cooper said.

A Titan II missile was a liquid-fueled rocket capped with multiple nuclear warheads and a guidance system that could put each payload on a different target. The chemicals in the rocket, the warheads and the guidance system all used material that gave off an array of chemicals and radiation, Cooper said.

The missile silos containing the weapons and their crews were closed, narrow concrete holes in the ground largely sealed off from the outside. Other veterans in other branches of the armed forces have similar, unusual close contact with potentially dangerous substances, Cooper said.

NW News on 05/19/2015

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