Official Urged Fewer Diagnoses of PTSD
May 22, 2008
It’s all about money unfortunately, not about what is right. Vote this year make your Vote count. Don’t be sheep actually look at what is going on.–D/C
By Christopher Lee
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, May 16, 2008
A psychologist who helps lead the post-traumatic stress disorder program at a medical facility for veterans in Texas told staff members to refrain from diagnosing PTSD because so many veterans were seeking government disability payments for the condition.
“Given that we are having more and more compensation seeking veterans, I’d like to suggest that you refrain from giving a diagnosis of PTSD straight out,” Norma Perez wrote in a March 20 e-mail to mental-health specialists and social workers at the Department of Veterans Affairs’ Olin E. Teague Veterans’ Center in Temple, Tex. Instead, she recommended that they “consider a diagnosis of Adjustment Disorder.”
VA staff members “really don’t . . . have time to do the extensive testing that should be done to determine PTSD,” Perez wrote.
Adjustment disorder is a less severe reaction to stress than PTSD and has a shorter duration, usually no longer than six months, said Anthony T. Ng, a psychiatrist and member of Mental Health America, a nonprofit professional association.
Veterans diagnosed with PTSD can be eligible for disability compensation of up to $2,527 a month, depending on the severity of the condition, said Alison Aikele, a VA spokeswoman. Those found to have adjustment disorder generally are not offered such payments, though veterans can receive medical treatment for either condition.
Perez’s e-mail was obtained and released publicly yesterday by VoteVets.org, a veterans group that has been critical of the Bush administration’s policies in Iraq and Afghanistan, and Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), a nonprofit government watchdog group.
“Many veterans believe that the government just doesn’t want to pay out the disability that comes along with a PTSD diagnosis, and this revelation will not allay their concerns,” John Soltz, chairman of VoteVets.org and an Iraq war veteran, said in a statement.
Melanie Sloan, executive director of CREW, said in a statement: “It is outrageous that the VA is calling on its employees to deliberately misdiagnose returning veterans in an effort to cut costs. Those who have risked their lives serving our country deserve far better.”
Veterans Affairs Secretary James B. Peake said in a statement that Perez’s e-mail was “inappropriate” and does not reflect VA policy. It has been “repudiated at the highest level of our health care organization,” he said.
“VA’s leadership will strongly remind all medical staff that trust, accuracy and transparency is paramount to maintaining our relationships with our veteran patients,” Peake said.
Peake said Perez has been “counseled” and is “extremely apologetic.” Aikele said Perez remains in her job.
A Rand Corp. report released in April found that repeated exposure to combat stress in Iraq and Afghanistan is causing a disproportionately high psychological toll compared with physical injuries. About 300,000 U.S. military personnel who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan are suffering from PTSD or major depression, the study found. The economic cost to the United States — including medical care, forgone productivity and lost lives through suicide — is expected to reach $4 billion to $6 billion over two years.
Ng said diagnosing PTSD often requires observing a patient for weeks or months because the condition implies a long, lingering effect of stress. “Most people exposed to trauma, in general, can get better,” Ng said. “You don’t want to over-diagnose people with PTSD. Whether it’s adjustment disorder is one thing. It’s usually a temporary disorder with severity that is not as bad as someone with full-blown PTSD.”
From National Veterans Foundation
New GI Bill update, Bill Clears the Senate, look who voted “NO”.
May 22, 2008
Folks get involved, Join the IAVA!!
D/C
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Active Duty Results are out.
May 22, 2008
Check with your Command!! We do not have access to the lists. Your command SEA has them.
Congrats all who made it.
When we get them, we will post them.
D/C
A hero of heroes
May 20, 2008
A hero of heroes
Army medic saved troops’ lives during two defining battles of WWII
“Sky full of airplanes. Hear enemy guns roar. Just pulverized entire field.” — July 25, 1944
Looking back at that diary entry, Gene Kleindl admits he had no idea what he was getting into when he walked into Rockford’s Camp Grant with his older brother, Cliff, and volunteered for the military in the middle of World War II. This was in 1942, when he was 20 years old.
“Everybody wanted to be in the service at that time,” Kleindl, now 85 and living in rural Capron, said. “There was excitement about the war, a sense of not being sure what was going on.”
Kleindl’s journey as an Army medic took him from Camp Grant to training in Texas and New Jersey and eventually to Normandy, France, where he landed on Utah Beach on D-Day, and then Bastogne, Belgium, for the Battle of the Bulge.
On May 26, Kleindl will serve as the honorary marshal of the Winnebago County Veterans Memorial Day parade. Kleindl has been marching in local parades since the 1950s. This year, he’ll also be representing “all the medics who served during wars,” parade Chairman Jeffrey Schroeder said.
Kleindl was in Europe for 17 months and saw 311 days of combat, by his count. He was a litter bearer with the 90th Infantry Division, nicknamed the “Tough ’Ombres,” primarily responsible for evacuating wounded soldiers and carrying them to medical stations.
Often, that included search missions under the cover of night or after fighting had ceased, looking for wounded who had been hidden by fellow soldiers making a hasty retreat. Other times, Kleindl performed routine medical checkups or dental work on soldiers if doctors were preoccupied.
In World War II, each Army company was assigned its own litter bearers, aid men, doctors, jeeps and other medical equipment. Aid men were in the thick of battles, tending to wounded soldiers immediately. The peril was so great that Kleindl often didn’t have a chance to learn an aid man’s name before someone else replaced him.
“I almost got asked to be an aid man once,” Kleindl said. “I thought that would be the end of me, but replacements came at the last minute.”
German troops generally respected the Red Cross patch that medics wore on their left sleeve and wouldn’t fire at them, Kleindl said. Some medics carried weapons, but not very often, Kleindl said.
Kleindl discovered an abandoned pistol at some point and carried it with him through the end of the war, though he never shot it. Years later, he took the gun out in his backyard for target practice, only to find it wouldn’t fire.
“I felt so brave carrying that pistol around, and it didn’t even work,” Kleindl said.
Kleindl was never gravely wounded but still had his share of close calls and saw the brutal effects of war: soldiers paralyzed by fear, unable or unwilling to move on the battlefield, and men shooting themselves in the foot to get a few days reprieve from combat.
“As a medic, all you’re trying to figure out is, ‘Is that one ours or theirs?’ and try not to get hit,” Kleindl said. “I did think sometimes, ‘Is this ever going to end? Am I ever going to get out of this place?’ ”
The memories are sharp and clear and come easily to Kleindl, at least the early years, before the “slow, hardening process of war” prompted his mind to gloss over some of the later, more horrific details. The relics of Kleindl’s service are confined mostly to his basement, which is lined wall to wall with uniforms, helmets, guns and photographs.
Kleindl collected a good portion of the souvenirs during his service, often when he searched or treated prisoners. He also kept a diary from the time he arrived in England to his discharge in fall 1945, the contents of which he transcribed and arranged in a three-ring binder, along with articles and photographs depicting other aspects of the war.
The entries chronicle everything from a day he spent playing the guitar and writing letters to his mother to the day he “kissed a nice gal on her cheek” while passing through a German village to the day in April 1945 when he saw his first concentration camp in Czechoslovakia.
Included among the accounts is an October 1945 Rockford Morning Star article heralding the Kleindl brothers’ return to Rockford. Kleindl found a job at JL Clark Corp., where he worked for 35 years, and ran a small printing business out of his home. He married the friend of his high school girlfriend and together they raised four children.
In retirement, Kleindl has kept busy with gardening and reconnecting with fellow World War II veterans, including those who remain from the 90th.
“When people talk about patriotism today and dying for the flag, that’s not really it,” Kleindl said. “You’re dying for your buddies that you bonded with back in basic training. Whatever you’re doing, you’re doing for them.”
Kleindl is scheduled to ride in a jeep for the parade on May 26, but if he has his way, he’ll be marching, joined by two of his grandchildren. Either way, he will be shedding light on an overlooked but crucial occupation, organizers say.
“Medics played a vital role, and the farther back you go, they played an even more vital role,” Schroeder said. “Many of them lost their lives, too. They’re very much unsung heroes.”
Kleindl doesn’t quite see it that way.
“I don’t feel qualified (to be parade marshal),” he said. “The dead people should be honored more than the living. I haven’t done anything in my opinion to be called a hero or get a special honor. I do appreciate it, though, when people seem to be interested in what I did.”
Staff writer Sarah Roberts can be reached at 815-987-1354 or smrobert@rrstar.com.
About Gene Kleindl
Age: 85
Hometown: Rockford. Moved to Capron in 1987
Education: Graduated East High School in 1942
Military service: Joined the Army in October 1942 and was discharged in 1945
Family: Wife, Joanne, four children and eight grandchildren
Hobbies: Gardening
Groups/organizations: Daniel Post 864, has marched in local Memorial Day parades since the 1950s
If you go
What: Winnebago County Veterans Memorial Day Parade and Memoriam Service.
Where: Downtown Rockford. Parade starts at Seventh Street and Third Avenue and ends at Beattie Park. The memorial service will be held on the banks of the Rock River behind the Rockford Public Library immediately after the parade ends.
When: 9 a.m. Monday, May 26
Cost: Free
Info: No rain date is scheduled. For more information, contact Jeffrey Schroeder at 815-963-6003.
Corpsman.com Chat Tuesday Night (TONIGHT) from 2100-2300 EST & May Newsletter info
May 20, 2008
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20 May 2008
Dee Dee Needs submissions!! Plus Chat tonight!!
Shipmates, Soldiers, Marines, Coasties, Airmen, Vets, Parents, Spouses, Significant others.. (Could not think of what to call you, ?? Come up with a better term please!) 
Chat tonight from 2100-2300 EST in our Scuttlebutt Chat area in our forums. You have to be logged in to access this area, (Logged into the forums.) to access the area. There will be plenty of camaraderie.. Come join us won’t you?
DeeDee our Newsletter editor could use some submissions and needs them ASAP for May’s Newsletter. She wants to get them out prior to Monday so please if you’re “GOING TO COMMIT, PLEASE SUBMIT!” Email them to Editor@corpsman.com . Remember this is Memorial Day, if you have a special something to say for this date, please send it to us and we will include it in our newsletter.
And last but “NOT” least, we are Taping our Podcast live tomorrow (WED) @ 2:30 EST, 1:30 CST, 12:30 MTN, and 11:30 PST. Go to our Corpsman.com Live page and you can listen to us bumble our way through the Netcast. I have a Co-host this week, “0311_DoC” who will join me for about a hour of hilarity..
All the Best!
Da-Chief
Doc’s Love being Green.
May 18, 2008
Ok this will start more fights withen our Corpsman community. Those of “US” who have served with the Corps, know it is a highly demanding, both physically and mentally, job. It is a job you hate when serving but you have to be taken away kicking and screaming from. Most of us would rather have our toe nails ripped from our feet then serve in a hospital or clinic after serving with the Corps.
To this day I remember SGTMAJ Saunders talk to me when I was leaving as BN Med Chief from 1/14;
“Chief, your gonna hate it at Naval Hospital Great Lakes, your to high speed low drag for that place, it’s going to drive you nuts with it’s bureaucracy. “
He was right of course.
I could tell you the stories after serving after 9/11, the hours that we served etc.. 24 on 24 off (If you were lucky) etc.. To come to a place where the Officers, and some of the enlisted were just plain “FAT & LAZY” but they were supreme “Ass-Kissers”. Boy they could whip off a meeting in a heartbeat to waste time. This was not what I was used to and absolutely hated it.
I look back now and I did learn from this posting though. I was lucky enough that I was able to leave NHGL and go to Naval Hospital Corps School as a instructor, Duty I loved and apecciated as we tried to impart our knowledge to our young students of what they were getting into as a Corpsman. Most of the staff at NHCS were Green Vets.
Take a look at the article below.. And remember we are coming up to Memorial Day weekend, what it is about etc.. We have a list of Doc’s on the front page since 9/11 who have given their all to our country, everyone of them were “GREEN”.
Doc loves being ‘green’
KOREAN VILLAGE, Iraq —
By Cpl. Ryan Tomlinson, Regimental Combat Team 5
2008-05-05
When a Navy hospital corpsman becomes “green,” he is placed on the front lines with the trust of the Marine Corps infantryman. He runs through the trenches, engaging the enemy, all while putting his own life on the line providing medical care for the wounded.
After four tours in two separate conflicts, Chief Petty Officer Truman A. Gartman, chief petty officer of the Battalion Aid Station, 2nd Light Armored Reconnaissance Battalion, Regimental Combat Team 5, has been a part of that trust for 14 years and counting.
“What I love most about being with the Marines is the amount of trust they have for (corpsmen),” said Gartman. “From the lowest, a private first class, to the higher-ups, a lieutenant colonel, they trust you with their life.”
The 38-year-old, from San Angelo, Texas, enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1987 and was sent to Sasapo, Japan, for his first duty station.
Gartman was in and out of minor trouble throughout the time he was in Japan, and this caught the attention of his command master chief.
“The command master chief was telling my officer in charge that, because of my attitude, I would be a perfect (infantryman) corpsman,” he said. “He gave me a choice between being separated and going to the green side.”
Gartman checked into 1st Marine Division out of Marine Corps Base Camp Pendleton, Calif., from which he deployed to his first conflict, Operation Desert Shield/ Desert Storm. During the engagements, the young doc cared for wounded Marines as U.S. forces held the Kuwaiti border.
After five years with 1st Marine Division, he went back to caring for Navy sailors. In 1999, he checked into 6th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, stationed out of Marine Corps Base Camp Lejuene, N.C.
“It was a privilege to be back on the green side for good,” said Gartman. “I missed it a lot, and it was great to return to the family.”
He experienced everything from being a standard line corpsman to his favorite duty of them all, a Marine Scout Sniper platoon corpsman with 3rd Bn., 6th Marine Regiment.
After all of the experiences of being a corpsman with a variety of infantry units in several different combat situations, Gartman still came back for more.
“No matter how bad the times were, I always sat down and analyzed what I could have done better,” said Gartman. “I always want to be here to train those who succeed me; that way all the mistakes that I’ve made, they won’t make.”
Now deployed with 2nd LAR on his third tour in Iraq, he trains all of his sailors in everything he knows about medicine and his hobby, construction. According to his sailors, he is used as a giant book of knowledge.
“He’s a good leader,” said Petty Officer 3rd Class Titus J. Willis, 25, a hospital corpsman with the BAS, 2nd LAR, from New Orleans. “When it comes to a scale of one through ten on training the sailors, I score him a twenty-five.”
“I hope to leave the hospital corps with better experiences passed down to the other corpsmen,” said Gartman. “I’m here to make all of my sailors not only better people, but better corpsmen”
Maine National Guard has forward thinking.
May 18, 2008
Kudo’s to the State of “MAINE’s” National Guard. They are testing folks for cognative skills etc prior to deploying to the mid-east. This is really the only way to know what folks have suffered due to brain injuries from the conflict over there. Not only does it help with Physical injuries but PTSD as well.
This article from WBZTV.com.
Maine Guard embarks on brain injury initiative
PORTLAND, Maine (AP) The Maine Army National Guard has embarked on a program to test its members before and after they’re deployed to Iraq and Afghanistan in what is thought to be the first state-level initiative to identify brain injuries in troops.
The Guard is collaborating with Dartmouth Medical School in giving computerized cognition tests to Guard members before they go overseas. It’s the same test given to National Football League players to test their memory and attention span.
The members will be given the same test when they return home to determine the extent of their brain injuries. Concussions are considered the signature wounds of war the force of explosives can rattle the brain against the skull, causing serious injury but untold numbers of soldiers don’t get diagnosed.
Elizabeth Pearson, the Dartmouth researcher who helped create the program, said more than 150 Guard members were tested earlier this year before they left for yearlong tours
”I just kept thinking ‘please come home safe,”’ Pearson said. ”I don’t know what’s going to happen between now and January. I hope everybody is right where they were.”
The project, which is funded by a three-year, $300,000 grant from the Maine Health Access Foundation, is being followed closely by other states, said Lt. Col. Patrick Tangney, the Maine Army National Guard state surgeon. The Army also is working on a plan similar to the one in Maine, he said.
The Veterans Affairs hospital in Togus is currently treating 62 Iraq and Afghanistan veterans for brain injury, said spokesman James Doherty. But the number of actual injuries is believed to be much higher.
Some veterans choose to see doctors in the civilian sector, while those still in active duty are treated by medical personnel with the Department of Defense. In some cases, doctors may not recognize the symptoms because of inexperience.
”A lot of physicians aren’t trained in brain injury or have minimal training, and so they miss it,” said Marcia Cooper, the project’s manager.
Some patients may underreport their symptoms, which include headaches, fatigue, dizziness and memory loss. And some may not exhibit any symptoms at an initial screening, said Kathy Russin, a licensed clinical social worker who works with Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans at Togus.
”I’ve had the opportunity to get to know someone and something just looked like it required more investigation, a year or two later,” she said.
Besides identifying brain injuries, the program is also trying to make sure troops get care if they need it. The program is holding two workshops for health care workers in June in Orono and Portland to improve their understanding of brain injuries.
Trailblazer–1st Female CMDCM retires.
May 18, 2008
1st female command master chief retires
Posted : Friday May 16, 2008 6:47:57 EDT
NORFOLK, Va. — Beth Lambert joined the Navy as a teenager in 1978 hoping to see the world.
She spent her entire first hitch in Meridian, Miss.
“I never even made it north of the Mason-Dixon line,” the command master chief said with a laugh.
Toward the end of her enlistment, she planned to get out and go to college. She changed her mind after being enticed by a three-year gig in Rota, Spain.
Lambert retired Wednesday, ending a 30-year career as a Navy trailblazer.
She was one of the Navy’s first female aviation structural mechanics, the first woman named Sailor of the Year, a member of the first class of female chiefs to deploy on an aircraft carrier, and perhaps most significant, the first female to serve aboard a carrier as command master chief — the highest-ranking enlisted sailor onboard.
She also found time to be a wife and mother.
Lambert, 48, eventually got to see the world that enticed her into the Navy. She has browsed Turkish bazaars, climbed Japan’s Mount Fuji and watched gondola races in Venice. She did tours in Greece, Cuba and Hawaii. But the highlights weren’t typically geographic.
One challenge she’ll never forget, for example, was serving aboard the carrier Eisenhower in 1994, on its first deployment with a mixed-gender crew.
“The Ike tour was absolutely wonderful for me. But it was very difficult at first,” she said. “Most sailors walk onto their first ship as junior sailors. I walked onto my first ship as a brand-new chief.”
She learned then that most Navy men were no different from the mechanics she worked alongside in her early years. Once they realized she’d pull her weight, they accepted her.
After being named Shore Sailor of the Year in 1988, Lambert spent time at the Pentagon, working in the office of the Master Chief Petty Officer of the Navy. She went from wearing greasy coveralls and fixing airplanes to donning dress whites and working alongside admirals.
Her first boss, Master Chief Bill Plackett, said that when he met Lambert, he knew she was special.
“There was no doubt in my military mind that she was going to be a master chief,” said Plackett, who now lives in Virginia Beach. “None. She has the strength of character and personality to take on day-to-day challenges and absorb them like a sponge.”
At the Pentagon, Lambert also impressed the chief of naval operations, the late Adm. Mike Boorda. Lambert said Boorda told her repeatedly that she should consider being commissioned as an officer.
“I made the decision that I was going to be a master chief instead,” Lambert said. “That was a little arrogant, but it worked out.”
She said she believes “men or women can lead men or women.” But young sailors with problems may be more likely to approach superiors who look like they do, so it’s important to have women in positions of power.
When she was selected in 2003 as command master chief for the carrier Theodore Roosevelt, it caused quite a sensation.
“But that didn’t matter to the chiefs,” Lambert said. “If anybody was resentful, they kept it to themselves.”
Some women who preceded Lambert into top ranks are sorry she’s retiring — they hoped she might one day become the first female MCPON.
Linn McDowell of Virginia Beach, who retired as a master chief petty officer in 1988, called Lambert’s selection as the Roosevelt’s command master chief an “amazing milestone.”
“That was a big brick in the pathway,” McDowell said. “I think she was up against a whole lot of competition, and a whole lot of guys who’d spent their careers at sea.”
As she rose in rank, Lambert’s duties changed.
“I’ve explained it to my mother this way,” she said. “I used to fix airplanes, now I fix attitudes. Airplanes are often easier but not nearly as rewarding.”
Her work with young sailors may be ending, but Lambert expects to be back around young people soon. The mother of three — she has a 22-year-old daughter and 8- and 11-year-old sons — plans to spend the summer hanging out with her boys.
Her husband, Jean P. Lambert, a master chief in the Seabees, plans to retire next year.
She said she’d like to teach science at a local high school.
From NAVYTIMES
Attack of Da-Chief Netcast
May 17, 2008
Title: Attack of Da-Chief Netcast
Location: Corpsman.com Live (Talk-Shoe)
Description: Corpsman.com Live’s weekly Netcast.
Hosts: Da-Chief, and 0311_Doc
Show is recorded “LIVE”
You can call in if you have a Talkshoe Account.
If you wish to be added to our NETCAST Mailing list contact admin1@corpsman.com
Start Time: 1330 CST
Date: 2008-05-21
End Time: 1430 CST
Everydaymemoir.com A writers Blog
May 17, 2008
It’s saturday.. lazing around.. Drinkin the coffee.. It’s my daughters “7th” birthday today. (Happy Birthday Courtney!)…
I am trying to find my niche on this site now.. I have nailed down our day to do the Netcasts (Wednesdays @ 1330 CST) and I am trying out a brodcasting partner this week.
One of the things I want to do on Saturdays is put up reviews of sits I visit. I will try to do 5 reviews each Saturday, so if your interested in what we look at etc, or just want to broaden your horizons, follow along with us.
Also, Just a FYI, I have comments turned on now for posts on the site, if you want to post a comment you can.
The first Blog/Site I am reviewing is called:
I know the author of the site and she has put a lot of effort and time into it’s creation.
it’s a farily new blog but one by a aspiring writer.
(Hint of the obvious, I am related to this writer. Comment below and see if you can guess who she is.).
If you want to see someone who puts thoughts to words in a way I never could, follow the authors prose.
She has a sense of humor I could never achieve, only hope to come close..
Paging Nurse Titty McBoobs
I found an interesting article on the Center for Nursing Advocacy’s website. The Fox News Channel’s Redeye and its host, Greg Gutfield, lived up to their time slot with a few suggestions about uniform requirements for nurses. See the full story on the Center for Nursing Advocacy website: http://www.nursingadvocacy.org/news/2008/apr/01_redeye.html
At my nursing school there was an instructor my friends and I referred to as Titty McBoobs, RN. Term of endearment? Lets just say I never registered for her classes or gave her any other form of acknowledgement.
I was thinking… If Greg Gutfield or his guest ever find themselves in need of medical attention in the greater Chicago area, maybe we could page Titty McBoobs. It might be his last day on earth, but at least he would die with an erection.
See what I mean.. Wicked… (Grin)
Take a look click the link above..
More to come later!!
D/C
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