Senate Calls On Obama To Handle VA Backlog Fiasco

Dan Bowman | FierceHealthIT | April 30, 2013

With the disability claims backlog debacle at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs spiraling out of control, outcry for the situation is reaching a fever pitch. Case in point, 67 U.S. senators on Monday sent a letter to President Obama calling for him to be more directly involved in the situation.

"After a decade of war, and despite the VA's efforts to modernize, more than 600,000 veterans are still stuck in the VA's disability claims backlog," the senators wrote. "While the average wait time for first time disability claims currently ranges between 316 and 327 days, veterans in certain parts of the country are waiting even longer--681 days in Reno, 642 days in New York … and 510 days in Philadelphia."