VA seeks Gulf War vets' comments
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May 15, 2013 |
Today, Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K.
Shinseki announced that the Department’s Gulf
War Veterans’ Illnesses Task Force will publish
a comprehensive draft report in the Federal
Register for public feedback and comment. The
report describes how the Department of Veterans
Affairs has been, and will continue to address
the concerns of Veterans who deployed during the
Gulf War in 1990 and 1991.
“We know Gulf War Veterans are experiencing
critical long-term medical issues that are
complex and difficult to label,” said Shinseki.
“VA has learned a great deal over the past 20
years about identifying, diagnosing and treating
Gulf War Veterans, and we will continue to
evaluate our research and clinical findings to
ensure we keep providing world-class health care
and benefits for Gulf War Veterans.”
Over the past several years, the Task Force has
refined an integrated roadmap to better
synchronize efforts and improve care and
services to Gulf War Veterans. VA is working
towards these efforts becoming a part of the
culture and operations.
This year’s report continues to focus on efforts
to improve health care for Gulf War Veterans
including innovative enhancements to clinical
care. The draft report identifies seven specific
areas where VA will strive to improve services
for Gulf War Veterans.
The seven areas focus on important components of
health care, such as Veteran-centric approaches
to specialty and primary care, delivering
Veteran benefits, and improving open
communications with Gulf War Veterans. The Task
Force also developed plans to improve linkages
between specialty knowledge and services at the
basic point of care to address treatment for
chronic multi-symptom illness, an ongoing
concern of Gulf War Veterans, their families and
their providers.
VA continues to support ongoing efforts by
providing clinical research and development,
which is outlined in the recent, first-ever
released Research Strategic Plan on Gulf War
Illnesses. This plan will be used to help refine
clinical practice and clinical education
throughout VA. VA continues to strengthen
partnerships to enhance medical surveillance
related to potential health impacts on Veterans
from the environmental exposures on today's
battlefields.
VA and the Department of Defense recently
approved a research project to develop a
long-term exposure record to collect and share
deployment and exposure data between the two
Departments, a model informed by lessons learned
in earlier Gulf War studies. “This decades-long
research and continuing partnership has not only
transformed the care and services to Gulf War
Veterans, but has also made us smarter about how
we care for Veterans of all eras.” said
Shinseki.
Today, VA is seeking public comments on the
draft Task Force report before final
publication. The public notice and instructions
for how to submit electronic and comments via
postal mail will be posted at
www.regulations.gov, and the draft written
report will be open for comment for 30 days.
In
addition, VA recognizes that a great number of
Gulf War Veterans use the Internet on a daily
basis to share their ideas and concerns, so VA
has also created a public discussion board on
the seven focus areas at:
http://vagulfwartaskforce.uservoice.com.
To
view the report without making recommendations,
please visit VA’s website at:
http://www.va.gov/opa/publications/Draft_2012_GWVI-TF_Report.pdf.
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