Veterans gathered in a parking lot across from the Veterans Affairs Community-based Outreach Center (VA CBOC) in Hamlet on Vance Street to sign a petition Monday morning.
Several veterans have continued to express dissatisfaction with the VA CBOC, even after Fayetteville VA Medical Center Director Elizabeth Goolsby notified veterans that the clinic in Hamlet would receive a second full-time provider this month. According to veterans and Goolsby, the unavailability of primary care physicians at the clinic has lead to frustration.
Lacy Shepherd, North Carolina Commander of AMVETS, lives in Richmond County. He has expressed dissatisfaction with the local VA CBOC.
“We’ve had a lot of guys who have had problems with doctors not filling out papers timely,” said Shepherd recently of the Hamlet clinic. “One doctor is not able to care for five counties. This clinic was put in the wrong place. It was rented, and should have been built like the others. Pembroke has a nice facility, with a complete staff. Now veterans from Laurinburg are going to Pembroke.”
The Hamlet VA CBOC has a multi-county reach, and includes Richmond, Scotland and Anson counties, as well as Chesterfield County in South Carolina. The Hamlet VA CBOC serves approximately 1,200 veterans and was designed to serve 3,600 veterans for years to come, according to the Department of Veterans Affairs in Fayetteville.
Shepherd said that although the VA tells patients they can email their providers directly, the providers do not give out their email addresses. He was alarmed when a doctor prescribed him medication without physically examining him, and was alarmed in another instance when he heard from another vet that his doctor spent the entire appointment filling out paperwork on a computer instead of speaking with the patient, so he could hurry back to Fayetteville.
Other area veterans are supportive of the VA.
Corey Gibbon of Rockingham is a Vietnam veteran who has been disabled for most of his life after the war. He was awarded a purple heart. He said he is satisfied with the services and treatments he has received through the VA.
“I’ve been going to the VA since 1970,” said Gibbon on Friday. “They’ve been good to me. I had cancer last year. I had my right hip replaced on January 15. I had my left hip replaced in August. They have been just outstanding. They put me a ramp up at my house. I got a scooter. If it hadn’t been for the VA, I’d have been dead.”
Gibbon said he knows some of his veteran friends in the area are taking part in the petition signing. He doesn’t agree with that approach.
“This is not going to do anything but hurt us (veterans),” said Gibbon. “We are lucky to have that place. (The veterans) have a choice; they don’t have to go to this clinic. There is no guarantee of benefits. They could close this clinic.”
Gibbon said patience is part of what has kept him happy with the VA. He said he waited a year for his first hip.
Goolsby said she was surprised to hear that veterans were gathering to garner signatures after the recent announcement that the Hamlet clinic would soon have two full-time providers.
“I spoke to one individual last week who is spearheading this, who said the veterans were concerned there wasn’t a second provider,” said Goolsby on Monday. “I told him one was hired and would begin in September, which he said he was well aware of. Hamlet is a difficult area to recruit for but we have been successful. I just hope this negative publicity won’t deter the provider from coming to Hamlet. I am committed to the health care needs in Hamlet, but I need the cooperation of veterans in the area to attract and keep well qualified providers there. I want to provide care close to home, with high quality and access to new technology.”
Goolsby said there are two appropriate avenues available to veterans who are dissatisfied with the clinic or care they are receiving. She said veterans can go to the clinic and talk to the nurse manager or they can visit the VA website, www.fayettevillenc.va.gov, and at the bottom of the page, click “Ask The Director,” which allows veterans and their family members to send comments or questions directly to Goolsby.
— Staff Writer Dawn M. Kurry can be reached at 910-997-3111, ext. 15, or by email at dkurry@heartlandpublications.com.
Granted the VA has huge challenges from claims processing to quality of patient care and budgets to do their work. No one is seeking to reinvent the VA but are simply highlighting what needs to be improved in Hamlet is appropriate.
I am a combat wounded vet with service connected disabilities and the VA is not doing veterans "a favor". Having satellite clinics helps the VA deal with the demand for care across a wide service area. Compassionate and effective medical care for military veterans is a nation's duty not a favor.
Until you speak to someone who controls what VA is willing to pay a physician to move to Richmond County, you are totally wasting your efforts.
As to your last statement, "Compassionate and effective medical care for military veterans is a nation's duty not a favor.",............. Well, that's a loaded statement.
A more accurate statement should read: "Compassionate and effective medical care for SERVICE CONNECTED disabled veterans is a nation's duty"....
I stand by my statement that the VA is doing a lot of vets a favor. If a person is being treated at the VA for a non service connected condition,and they aren't carrying a combined rating of 50% or greater, they are receiving a benefit they aren't entitled to, and wasn't agreed to by the taxpayer.
Under different circumstances, I would complain about having to wait in line behind people like this to get health care. Thankfully though, the VA has responded to people in my situation with these handy dandy things called priority groups. They are numbered 1-8 to quickly seperate severely disabled service connected vets(group 1), from those looking for a type of handout(group 5).
The exact tables and qualifying criteria for each can be found at
http://www.va.gov/healthbenefits/resources/priority_groups.asp
These priority groups ensure that "disabled vets" don't have to stand in line behind malingerers to get good, quick, taxpayer approved, access to quality health care that they have earned.
Notice those of us in group 1 aren't usually the ones complaining?
The sooner we can seperate the "disabled vets" from the "lazy vets", the sooner we can cause change at the VA.
As far as I'm concerned, claiming the title "disabled vet" at Joe Carroll, Rockingham
P.S. None of this applies to those with claims pending with the VBA. It takes Winston-Salem so long to make a decision,(years in most cases), I think they should give all of you 50% until you get an initial decision.
As a leader she should deal with it and not blame signatures on a petition. "Needing the cooperation of veterans" sounds allot like "don't complain, trust me, I'll fix it." Well, you haven't done it to date.
Be a leader and step up and take the criticism due you and the VA and get to work. The veterans will support you and the CBOC 100% when words turn in to action. These problems have been long running and won't be solved by another promise of action...people expect to see it.
Elizabeth Goolsby
Elizabeth Goolsby has no say over the VA's compensation rates for physicians. She can only do so much. She probably can't publicly say so, but the best and brightest aren't going to work for what the VA is willing to pay. This is true in Hamlet, Fayetteville, or anywhere else where the VA doesn't have access to under priced interns, like say, Durham. Anyone who has had the opportunity to experience both Durham VA and Fayetteville VA found the Durham experience superior I'm sure, but what they may not realize is that Durham has access to Duke University, and Fayetteville is a standalone hospital.
These are problems that are quite outside Mrs. Goolsby's control.
I personally have been utilizing the Hamlet CBOC for a couple of years now. The health support staff there is second to none. I'd put it up against any CBOC in the country, and I've been to many.
Granted, the physicians there usually stink. They're disconnected, uncaring, and always seem rushed. But, in fairness to that CBOC, I've never had a physician created problem there that the staff,(usually Ms. Dunlap), couldn't fix within a matter of a few hours with a simple call to Fayetteville.
If everyone wants to get together and have a protest/petition, we should all ride to D.C. and put the complaint where it belongs. Ms. Goolsby would probably advocate for programs that would entice a physician to move here, but you alienate her when you wrongly place the blame at her feet.
Getting substandard physicians due to compensation issues is a Washington D.C. issue, not a Fayetteville VAMC issue.
Joe Carroll, Rockingham.