Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA)

See the following -

VA Claims Backlog Saddles Disabled Veterans

Mitch Shaw | Standard-Examiner | February 5, 2014

Department of Veterans Affairs officials say they want to end their massive benefits backlog for disabled veterans by next year, but a new study says progress on the initiative has stalled. Read More »

Concern Grows Over ‘Epidemic' Veteran Suicide Rate

Rob Hotakainen | The News Tribune | May 26, 2011

With veterans now accounting for one of every five suicides in the nation, the Department of Veterans Affairs is under pressure from both the courts and Congress to fix its mental-health services in an attempt to curb the death toll. Read More »

How Can Government Battle A 'Suicide Epidemic' Among Veterans?

Jordain Carney | National Journal | April 3, 2014

The Fort Hood shooting is an extreme and shocking example of what has become a chronic concern for the military: soldiers with mental-health problems taking their own lives.  And it's not just the active-duty military who face what has become an increasingly daunting problem.

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Introduce Bipartisan Bill To Extend Emergency Care Coverage For Veterans

Press Release | PoliticalNews.me | October 31, 2013

U.S. Senators Mazie K. Hirono, Jerry Moran (R-KS), Johnny Isakson (R-GA) and Mark Begich (D-AK), members of the Senate Committee on Veterans’ Affairs, announced new legislation this week to help extend emergency care coverage for veterans. Read More »

Military Suicides Decline, But Continued Failures Hold Lessons For Future Wars

Molly O'Toole | Defense One | November 23, 2014

...All across the country there are families like Wayne Telford’s. The year his daughter died was one of the worst for suicides in military the since the Pentagon started closely tracking the data in 2002...

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Peer Support Key To Helping Veterans Overcome Mental Health Problems

Andy Marso | Kansas City Public Media | December 29, 2014

...About one-third of the 2.6 million veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan have been diagnosed with mental illnesses like PTSD, anxiety and depression.  The VA Eastern Kansas Health Care System which includes the Topeka hospital where Stucker was treated, is seeing more patients for PTSD every year: up from 1,297 in 2011 to 2,216 in 2014...

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Sixty-Seven Senators Urge Obama To Resolve VA Claims Backlog

Bob Brewin | Nextgov | April 29, 2013

More than two-thirds of the U.S. Senate sent a letter to President Obama Monday urging his “direct and public involvement” to end the Veterans Affairs Department’s disability claims backlog. Read More »

Suicides Outpacing War Deaths For Troops

Timothy Williams | New York Times | June 8, 2012

The suicide rate among the nation’s active-duty military personnel has spiked this year, eclipsing the number of troops dying in battle and on pace to set a record annual high since the start of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan more than a decade ago, the Pentagon said Friday. Read More »

The Nerd-In-Residence

Craig Newmark | Craigconnects | September 13, 2013

The Department of Veterans Affairs has named me a "nerd-in-residence." You can find more under VA team bios > Craig Newmark. Read More »

The Wait We Carry: Using Data Visualization To Capture America's Failure To Take Care Of Its Veterans

Rebecca J. Rosen | The Atlantic | June 24, 2013

Some 600,000 veterans have seen their disability-benefit claims founder unanswered for more than 125 days. Read More »

Vets Call for VA EHR Optimization, Interoperability Advances

Sara Heath | EHR Intelligence | September 15, 2016

The Department of Veterans Affairs needs an overhaul of its Veterans Information Systems and Technology Architecture (Vista) EHR — either in the form of EHR optimization or a commercial EHR replacement — to improve care quality for American veterans, several veterans groups have claimed. Purchasing a commercial EHR may alleviate some of the VA’s issues in developing a robust health IT system, Harvey suggested. Few hearing witnesses disagreed that VA’s health IT infrastructure and EHR system need a significant overhaul...

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Why Obama's Mental-Health Initiatives Will Leave Many Troubled Vets Without Help

Eric Katz | National Journey | September 4, 2014

President Obama last week unveiled a series of measures to improve mental-health care for veterans, ranging from awareness campaigns to increased funding for brain chips to treat post-traumatic stress disorder.  Some advocates, however, do not believe Obama's efforts go far enough...

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