“The issue isn’t whether the VA hires more behavioral health specialists or whether the military hires more behavioral health specialists. They’re hiring them from a set pool. The fact of the matter is we don’t have enough.” - Retired Gen. Peter Chiarelli.
A veteran of the Iraq War with post-traumatic stress disorder talks to physical therapist Nicole Bormann before a session in the VA Medical Center in St. Louis. - Chris Hondros/Getty Images
A few days ago we posted an article about the shortage of Psychiatric Nurse Practitioners (here: “It Took Almost a Year to Quit My Job!“) and the effect it was having on education and the nursing profession in general.
Over the past few days numerous news reports have surfaced regarding the same shortage of Psych NPs, but specifically dealing with the huge deficit in caregivers for US Veterans returning home. NKU is committed to serving the Nation’s Veterans and was named one of the most Vet-friendly campuses in the US. Not only that, but just this month NKU joined with First Lady Michelle Obama and Dr. Jill Biden to commit to further educate our nation’s 3 million nurses so they are prepared to meet the unique health needs of service members, veterans and their families (full news report available here). With that in mind, The Department of Advanced Nursing Studies announced the addition of the Family Psychiatric & Mental Health Nurse Practitioner (PMHNP) concentration to its advanced practice curriculum. More information is available here.
From NPR today:
Over the past five years, the Department of Veterans Affairs says, the number of former service members seeking mental health services has climbed by a third. In response, the agency has boosted funding and tightened standards.
Now, any vet asking for help is supposed to be evaluated within 24 hours and start treatment within two weeks. The VA has claimed that happens in the vast majority of cases, but a new investigation by the agency’s inspector general says the VA statistics are skewed to make wait times appear shorter.
“It illustrates, in incredible clarity, how dysfunctional the VA system is right now for thousands of veterans around the country,” he says.
The inspector general’s report says, rather than starting the clock from the moment a vet asks for mental health care, the VA has been counting from whenever the first appointment became available. That could add weeks or months to the wait time.
So while the VA has been saying 95 percent of vets were seen as quickly as they were supposed to be, nearly 100,000 patients had to wait much longer. At the VA Medical Center in Salisbury, N.C., for example, the average wait was three months. Patrick Bellon, an activist with Veterans for Common Sense, says the government has been too slow to increase mental health services.
“You don’t see the real cost in human terms until 20 to 30 years after the conflict has ended,” Bellon says. “Only recently have we seen an attempt to increase resources to deal with that cost.”
Veterans for Common Sense is suing the VA over delays in treatment, and over the time it takes some vets to get benefit payments. The VA announced plans to hire nearly 2,000 additional mental health staff last week, just days before this report came out.
Bellon says he believes that should help.
“I firmly believe the issue is supply, so I’m hoping that if [we] increase the supply, fewer veterans will be turned away,” he says. However, Retired Gen. Peter Chiarelli, former vice chief of staff of the Army, says the supply of good clinicians is not growing fast enough.
“The issue isn’t whether the VA hires more behavioral health specialists or whether the military hires more behavioral health specialists,” Chiarelli says. “They’re hiring them from a set pool. The fact of the matter is we don’t have enough.”
Attorney Dan Brier is suing the VA on behalf of Stanley Laskowski, an Iraq vet diagnosed with PTSD in 2007. Brier says that even though his client was diagnosed and was in the VA system, he never got the help he needed.
“Since he never received any psychotherapy as the VA protocols require, I’m afraid that in Mr. Laskowski’s case, it was an issue of appropriate resources not being available,” Brier says.
Laskowski ended up abusing drugs, getting arrested and losing his job; he’s seeking millions in compensation from the VA.
The Department of Veterans Affairs declined to comment for this story, but the VA released a statement saying it endorses the inspector general’s findings. The agency agrees it needs to change the way it counts wait times, and that it also needs to improve staffing.
The report notes that the inspector general pointed out similar problems seven years ago. At a Senate hearing Wednesday, the VA will have another chance to explain how it’s going to do better.
For more information about NKUs program visit the Department of Advanced Nursing.
Information also available about the Nurse Practitioner Advancement program here.
General information:
Mental health describes a level of psychological well-being, or an absence of a mental disorder.[1][2] From the perspective of ‘positive psychology’ or ‘holism’, mental health may include an individual’s ability to enjoy life, and create a balance between life activities and efforts to achieve psychological resilience.[1] Mental health can also be defined as an expression of emotions, and as signifying a successful adaptation to a range of demands.