VA being VA.

VA Medication Mess-up

I have moved to another address and knowing the VA I had made a back-up plan with my psychiatrist if I could not get an appointment in the time needed to refill my medications I would be able to email and have my old one refilled and sent to me. Of course VA did not disappoint me, I still have not gotten a mental health appointment, it is in February, so I emailed and the prescription was filled. Now here is where this is a total VA thing – It was sent to my old address. Not only that but the new prescription, I was given also, got sent to the old address. I changed my address at the VA hospital as soon as I moved (months ago). I went to track the prescriptions and saw they were delivered to the old address last week, all of them.

On top of that my ebenefits account changed my address back to the old one after I put in the new one, again months ago.

So now the new medications that I have been waiting for over 6 months to finally get to help is hours away from me. Plus, the old medications that I have been on for a while, and if I go cold-turkey I’ll be in the ER, is also at the old address. On top of it all the new medication was sent from the old pharmacy – how did this happen, oh yea, it was VA.

More consults for no reason.

This is the annoyance of dealing with the VA and continually having to remind them that I have experienced MST and that I am not about to allow any male to touch me – and do not care who it is (unless completely necessary). I went to my chiropractic consulting appointment, which on its own is completely stupid! I have already been to many chiropractic consulting appointments, and after they say that I need chiropractic, then either the policies changes or I happen to move and it is all over from the start, as if I had never seen a VA chiropractor in the first place.

So changing from one VISN to another is like changing from one country to another. I had to put in for a change in address from different parts of the VA since they all do not talk to each other. I then get to see a new primary care physician, who this one did not even look in my records before seeing me. The clinic did not print out my medication list to have on hand either. No, I see her and she asks me what are all the problems that I have – really? I have been in the VA system for over 20 years and you want me to list what is going on right now, what comes up ever so often and anything else that I can think of? Well first off one of the difficulties I have is with my memory. After that comment I actually got a “and what else?”

So I had to wait to get here to start the process of seeing a new PCP so that I could get a consult to Chiropractic, even though I have had them in the past and had been given Chiropractor services right after that. The one time that I had to get another opinion was when I went to where I had to go today and I swear it is the same guy who wrote in his notes that there was nothing wrong with my back or neck. Then had an exam which gave me service-connected disability for my neck. This was the same guy who told me that if I needed Chiropractic services I should just drive there and he would try to fit me in. He knew that I lived four and a half (4 ½) hours away from the facility. He did not think there was anything wrong with that. So if I am having pain in my back and neck I should get in a car and travel 4 ½ hours to get adjusted then 4 ½ hours back? Yea, this was the Chiropractic specialist.

So I drive 45 minutes to get to this appointment. The guy (who like I said I swear is the same idiot) asked me a bunch of questions. One of the questions that I always have a problem with is –on a scale of 1 to 10, what is your pain level right now, and what is it when your neck hurts? Now let’s just think about that for a second. My levels are definitely not another persons. My 10 is having my face sewn up without any anesthesia, a 9 is some of my migraines and an 8 is childbirth without drugs. And really what in the world is that question for if there is no baseline? If you do not know what I think is a 2, then saying a 2 is useless. You may think a 2 is a bee sting – that and even paper cuts do not get above 1 for me. I get migraines that hurt so bad the idea of bashing my head into a wall to make the pain stop, is very real for me. Then I go to an ER and get shots (I hate shots –like there is no tomorrow), but I not only get a shot but tell them that I normally get two, and that’s not a 10. There needs to be some type of pain level which gives a few of the numbers to what normally people have been through, like a paper cut.

I answer what I can remember, which at times it is “I don’t know, I can’t remember.” I can read people pretty well now, and I can see in the body language, in his tone, and in the questions that he is not at all interested in helping me, more like trying to find reasons to not agree to services. After all the questions he says that he is going to do an exam, do I have any questions? Yes, is there a woman chiropractor? He says no, “is that a problem?” Really? Is it a problem that someone who I have never met before wants me to lay down and put his hands on my neck and down my back – yea! I have a serious problem with that. I just said yes, I did and his demeanor went from irritated to annoyed, very annoyed and he said that this is over and that he would check me out of the clinic. There was another guy in there, to assist and the questionable look on his face told me this was not right. I did not question but I know that he is going to write up something so that it is going to take me going back in my records, getting the last chiropractic treatment plan that I had, which was right before I moved, and then having to file to see someone else before I can get any services.

This is so aggravating. I tell the VA all the time that I do not want a male nurse, male therapist, male doctor, or male rehabilitation therapist. I understand there are some that are just going to be male. I have seen male neurologists, male dermatologist who was allowed to look at my arm, but I am very particular about having any male help. I do not like anyone to touch me, but I know that there are times when if I have to allow it so that I can get the help that I need, but only a few parts of my body for that, my back and neck, no. My foot, my arm, my leg to the knee, the top of my head, my arm to just above my elbow; that is pretty much all, and only when it is completely necessary, and this was not. And with having the VA changing people on me all the time, it does not help, that whole trust issue comes into play.

Why the chiropractor cannot look at the detailed treatment plan, the x-rays and all the other notes from VA doctors and even VA chiropractors is beyond me. If the plan that was written by my chiropractor (outside the VA) was agreed to by the VA and the treatment was authorized for pay, then why do I have to have another consult? Why not just look at my records? That is the VA system. Some do all they can to not help veterans, and I have come across many of them.

Since there are some great medical staff working at the VA, I always have hope that I will come across them. I know it is inevitable that I will deal with the ones who think it is their job to deny as many veterans as they can, and others just have a job and do nothing beyond what they have to do, but I always have hope.