The Mid-Atlantic Regional Group

Blinded Veterans Association

Legislative News

July 28, 2009

Yesterday afternoon the House of Representatives passed key pieces of legislation that the Blinded Veterans Association had worked on and strongly supported for months. We are especially pleased with the bill that included the Elimination of Co- Payments for Catastrophically Disabled Veterans “Congresswoman Halverson” introduced this for BVA back in March, and the increase in the home structural alteration amount from the current $ 4,000 up to $6,800 for future service connected veterans. The legislation on Research will also help improve coordination of new emerging medical, surgery, or technology research within VA medical centers and we were supportive of this effort.

House Passes Bill to Provide Unprecedented Support to Veteran Caregivers

Washington, D.C. – On Monday, July 27, 2009, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Bob Filner (D-CA) announced that the House of Representatives approved three bills that would improve benefits and services to veterans provided by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA).  The legislation approved by the House includes a comprehensive bill to expand necessary life insurance options for veterans and their families, as well as improve medical services at VA hospitals and clinics around the country, a bill to streamline the process for nonprofit research and education corporations to participate in VA research endeavors, and a bill to provide essential support and training to those caring for this Nation’s wounded veterans.

“Today, the House passed a slate of bills that will have a significant impact on the lives of veterans when they become law,” said Chairman Filner.  “I would specifically like to thank the freshman Members of this Committee for their ability to get right to work and address the needs of our Nation’s veterans.”      

H.R. 3155, as amended – Caregiver Assistance and Resource Enhancement Act (Michaud)

The July 2007 report of the President's Commission on Care for America's Returning Wounded Warriors (Dole-Shalala Commission) found that of the 1,730 injured OEF/OIF veterans surveyed, about 21 percent of active duty, 15 percent of the reserve, and 24 percent of retired or separated service members had friends or family who gave up a job to be a caregiver.  H.R. 3155 would provide support services to family and non-family caregivers of veterans, including educational sessions on how to be a better caregiver; one-stop access to support services via a dedicated caregiver support Internet website; and information and outreach.  The bill would also make counseling and mental health services available to family and non-family caregivers of veterans. 

Chairman Filner offered the following support for H.R. 3155: “Today, more service members are surviving the wounds of war than those injured in previous conflicts. This vital bill passed by the House today will provide immediate support for our wounded warriors – by providing support to their caregivers.  I thank Mr. Michaud for his hard work to address the needs of the caregivers who sacrifice so much to attend to the needs of our veterans as they heal from the wounds of war.”   

H.R. 3219 – To make certain improvements in the laws administered by the Secretary of Veterans Affairs relating to insurance and health care. (Filner)

This comprehensive bill would expand options for veterans and service members to obtain life insurance policies that better fit their needs, and the needs of their families.  The bill also improves health services for veterans by increasing participation of physician assistants at the Veterans Health Administration, prohibiting the collection of copayments for certain veterans who are catastrophically disabled, establishing a ‘Committee on Care of Veterans with Traumatic Brain Injury’, waiving housing loan fees for some disabled veterans, expanding nursing home care for certain veterans, and allowing Medal of Honor recipients to receive a priority status for medical services.

H.R. 3219 includes provisions from nine bills previously approved by the House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs.  The bills are H.R. 2774 (Halvorson), H.R. 2379 (Buyer), H.R. 2968, as amended (Kirkpatrick), H.R. 1197 (Mitchell), H.R. 1302 (Hare), H.R. 1335, as amended (Halvorson), H.R. 1546 (McNerney), H.R. 2180 (Teague), and H.R. 2926, as amended (Nye).

H.R. 2770, as amended – Veterans Nonprofit Research and Education Corporations Enhancement Act of 2009 (Filner) 

This bill would modify and update provisions of law relating to nonprofit research and education corporations so they can better support VA research.  Specifically, this bill expands the general authorities on establishing nonprofit research corporations by authorizing the creation of multi-medical center research corporations where two or more VA medical centers share one corporation and improves accountability of the corporations by detailing the audit requirements.

“Research is a very vital mission of the Department of Veterans Affairs,” stated Chairman Filner.  “Focusing on research for the special health care needs of veterans, VA’s program has been recognized for excellence over the years.  Boasting such developments as the cardiac pacemaker and the CAT scan, VA also lays claim to three Nobel Laureates and six Lasker Award winners.  This bill will strengthen research efforts at the VA and better serve veterans.”    

The bills will next be considered by the U.S. Senate. 

The following information also is provided by VA headquarters and for those veterans interested in the computer health care records system and advances being made there, hopefully this will be of some interest to you.

VA Medical Imaging Reaches Record Level

WASHINGTON -- VistA Imaging, the medical and health care imaging system used in Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers, attained over one billion stored images in January this year, according to the department. 

“Using this technology, VA has established an unprecedented number of medical images in its database, allowing VA physicians immediate access to patient records regardless of their location,” said Dr. Gerald Cross, VA’s acting under secretary for health, said.  “Our Veterans don’t have to wait for hospital staff to find x-rays or make comparisons between a patient’s past and current records.”

The imaging system captures clinical images, scanned documents, motion video and other non-text data, and makes them part of the patient's electronic record.

In the course of serving 1.2 million patients a month, VA stores 20-25 million images in the VistA Imaging system.  In 2009, a total of 290 million are expected to be stored.  Storage space used today is approximately one pedabyte -- one million gigabytes.

Using digital images makes remote diagnosis and treatment possible and permits in-home monitoring of some patients’ conditions.  It eliminates travel for patients needing follow-up care and makes services available in medically underserved areas.

Storing images on magnetic and optical disks provides both long-term access and recovery in disasters.  Following Hurricane Katrina in 2006, 5.4 million VA images -- nearly 100 percent -- were recovered from VistA Imaging at the New Orleans VA Medical Center, even though the optical servers had been underwater.  These images could be viewed remotely from any VA site and that capability enabled VA to continue providing treatment to Veterans displaced by Katrina when they visited another VA facility.

VistA Imaging first became operational in 1990 at the Washington, D.C., VA Medical Center to handle radiology, and in 1999, VA spread its use to all VA medical centers.  The system and its leadership have been recognized with awards and published articles since 1993.

More than 7.8 million Veterans are enrolled in the VA health care system

Tom Zampieri

Director Government Relations, Blinded Veterans Association, Washington, DC  

BVA's Legislative Alerts Group

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