Signed Choice Made Easy

Signed choice

it's been over a year since president barack obama signed into law the veterans access choice and Accountability Act the law directed a new program to be established to better serve the healthcare needs of the nation's veterans today the veterans Choice Program is now in place but in Oklahoma and elsewhere it has had a rough start leaving many veterans without the health care they need in a timely manner combat war veteran and marek win we surprised when she became pregnant with her fourth child when I thought I was pregnant it was 20 weeks and I needed to get in ASAP to get prenatal for the baby and I wasn't able to mark when was confused because getting prenatal care for her third child was a breeze this time I had a fly to fight them like I was like I can I get an appointment who don't get contact with her fourth child mark Winne was directed to use the veterans Choice Program for setting up an OBGYN appointment triwest healthcare alliance located in phoenix arizona is contracted by the federal government to administer the veterans Choice Program he wouldn't do like the answer the phones don't work for the VA so they don't understand and so I called like three days later and I was like I haven't gotten my appointment and they said they said well ma'am if you just quit calling so much maybe we can get this done faster so I was like excuse me you're talking to veteran that needs health kicks I am when I was like 24 weeks pregnant by man she didn't get in to see a doctor until a month later when she was seven months pregnant Stacy Williams is the program application specialist with the Muscogee veterans medical center it rolled out so fast and I know there's a lot of kinks and a lot of frustration with it but I can also see and we here on our weekly calls they're advocating and they're working diligently to get some of those things changed William says veterans Choice allows vets to schedule an appointment with a doctor outside of the VA if the wait to be seen is longer than 30 days or if the closest veterans clinic is more than 40 miles from where the veteran lives people who who live really far from a VA Medical Center such as Hugo or you know even as far as close as Bartlesville to Tulsa but there's still an hour drive they're able to see somebody locally or without having to wait and also without having to drive Morton comprehensive health system has satellite clinics in Bartlesville and no water in addition to three Tulsa clinics Morton applied for and has been approved as a veterans Choice site for primary care doctor Laura Dempsey Pollan is Morton's vice president of community involvement she says behavioral health needs can also be met well let's say that someone is really having an anxious day and they're having difficulty coping through the day we can see them with a pre-authorization again in our behavioral health setting and we just have to make that appointment and get them in right away so that they can sit down and talk to a counselor and work through things dr. Dempsey pullen says they're just getting the program started but she was assured getting preauthorization from TriWest would be no problem as part of his job with the community service council of Tulsa gym while overseas the integration of services for military veterans the early report is that the application process is complicated and it's slow to evolve for me particularly no it has not worked one veteran t-bone Massey says the VA doesn't have a specialist that can address his skin condition Massie hope veterans Choice would allow him to see a private doctor with the expertise needed they sent me to a private doctor but at times then they have to approve each time I see the doctor if it's worthy enough for them to spend any kind of money and some of the treatments I need right now the VA is not going for it and he says the wait time for his authorizations been too long sometimes I would take a month to two months between appointments and now it's at the point well he's not really wanting to see me anymore because the bill not one to cover the payments but Massey does say some veterans have been satisfied with veterans choice Stacy Williams says in the last year her office has sent private care authorizations for 10,000 veterans whose wait times have been more than 30 days while says the VA is moving in the right direction to better serve veterans but that it still has a long way to go they have a unique need to address female veterans the last I heard our local VA was treating over a thousand female veterans and with the end of many deployments the VA is becoming responsible for the well-being of more veterans each day we are seeing an increase in veterans coming in to be enrolled with the VA system in the past two years we've had about a five point five percent increase so they are coming out we're getting more female veterans