My Dad is in terrible back pain. He has spinal stensosis, and 2 slipped discs. HIs Parkinsons keeps him moving so he's jarring his back over and over again
He had an visit with a pain doc for the first time in 2 years scheduled for Monday, but he just got a call. Since this visit is on his medicaid, and not the VA, they cancelled his appointment.
My Mom tried to help explain, she was told "I'm talking to Him, not you"
She finally said the doctor must be paid, and cancelled his appointment.
@gemswinc All I want is for him to get some help. He's been calling looking for another appointment, but the fastest they can get him in is mid October.
That's a long time to wait when you can't sleep because of the pain.
Since I am in the Durham NC veterans area, the way I would deal with it is to call the Durham VAMC switchboard and ask for the number to speak with PATIENT RELATIONS, then ask to be connected.
Was the call from the VA itself, from a contracted scheduling company hired by the VA, or from an outside doctor's office?
That sounds like exactly what VA appointment schedulers used to be like.
The VA recently contracted a new appointment scheduling business which really sucks. I think it was an insider profit making move by one of the VA administrators.
@Priestess This was the doctors office. He's paying for this one with his medicaid, or he was.
Count on it. Filed my Consumer Complaint on Mission Hospital, for-profit in Asheville NC with Attorney General, Josh Stein.
@LnzyHou @NiveusLepus
That's how to do it! Good for you, and thank you for all health care consumers.
I was getting the runaround from the VA in 2010 or thenabouts. I asked the scheduling clerk to hold while I connect to the White House.
(Even that didn't help).
VA scheduling clerks didn't start getting better until some of them started losing their jobs.
Healthcare is completely broken. Profit has killed it.
@NiveusLepus
Unfortunately, many doctors don’t accept Medicaid, because it pays so little. I’m unclear about why he was referred out of the VA system in the first place. Are there no pain doctors in the VA? Or is his problem not service connected?
@Smccune55 I think it may not be service connected.
@LnzyHou @Smccune55 They can for some issues. It's a bit of a morass.
Never known any veteran turned away from VA hospital for any health reason. Including my own father.
Dad keeps getting denied for a greater amount of service connected disability assistance for instance, because while he was stationed in Iwo Jima running a Loran station for a year, and then did clean up duty on Guam. They lost all the records for his time in Guam, and so they can't verify his toxic exposure.
The benefits coordinator says this is very common as the computerization of records was imperfect.
This is west Texas. Trump country big time for the politicos... As to that is where it ends, maybe? They are on appeal.
All the records of his entire unit cannot be lost. Can’t they investigate conditions of other members of his unit?
@LnzyHou @Smccune55 They have to be able to verify he was there. He was assigned in Guam on temporary duty, independent of his unit, while rotating back to the states.
It's when they gave him his new assignment and he got a little tipsy that he got into a dispute with another enlisted man, which was fine until his temp CO got in the way of the first punch.
They reassigned him to New Jersey, where he met my mom.
They have found some deep in the weeds reason to yoga around approving him.
Where is temporary CO? His records missing too?
@LnzyHou @Smccune55 I'm honestly not sure buddy.
@NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
I wonder if #BetoORourke could help. I'm not being facetious. If he can't personally, I'm betting someone in his office or circle can. With zero cynicism, I think this crusade might be a boost for his campaign. Plus he just seems a very decent human.
https://betoorourke.com/issue/serve-veterans/
@wolfwoman @LnzyHou @Smccune55 That's a good idea.
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @Smccune55
Agree. Sure wouldn’t leave it to the VA.
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 Isn't he one of the very rich people from a rich family that said they were not going to take big corporate money and run a grassroots campaign, but then he changed his mind because it was "important" and ran an oil money plus grassroots campaign that failed and now we have Abbot's Texas?
That Beto O'Rourke? Yeah. Seems nice.
But whose side is he on?
@AskTheDevil @wolfwoman @LnzyHou @Smccune55 Not to play Devil's advocate, but I do not believe any politician has clean hands.
@NiveusLepus @AskTheDevil @wolfwoman @Smccune55
Nor do I. Politics is a very dirty business.
@LnzyHou @NiveusLepus @wolfwoman @Smccune55 I think part of the way that is able to continue is that it's been allowed to continue so long that people just act like it's supposed to be that way.
I don't think it is. I don't think corruption and lies and broken promises and venality and moral failure are a natural and essential part of politics, I think they're diseases that we should get out of politics.
Why do we stand for it?
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @wolfwoman @Smccune55
Another unanswerable question. I’m not sending 💰 next election. I’ve been driven mad by multiple/daily requests from every democrat running (and even trump) despite the fact I’m already contributing to key races for months.
The fear tactics are insufferable.
@AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @NiveusLepus @Smccune55
And this - I've read a lot on the #psychology of such things. Again, what to share 🤔
@wolfwoman @AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @Smccune55
Share whatever makes your wolfish heart happy ^_^
@NiveusLepus @wolfwoman @LnzyHou @Smccune55 That feels like a very serious problem all its own.
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 I have obviously not done enough homework.
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 Note that what I presented here was a narrative, the way I see it.
That's what it looked like to _me_.
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 We get a lot of smoke and mirrors and flag-waving and fanfare in these big expensive elections.
It's less that you haven't done your homework, and more that everything's a circus designed to fool people.
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
Will you please point me to any/everything that details this? We all know widipedia isn't accurate but I haven't found anything thus far ...
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 I am just remembering what I can of his campaign. It felt like he popped up almost like a mushroom, made a big deal about grassroots and self-funded campaign, then when it looked tough, too corporate and big donor money, then lost his bid anyway.
Is that _not_ things that happened?
I mean, I'm not sure I remember which year he ran without looking it up, so I wouldn't trust my memory.
...
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
But pretty sure I remember him being grassroots, then not, then losing, and now Texas is speaking Trumpian.
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
I'm very tardy getting back to this, but I didn't have time to dig deeply until just now. I'm saving up several links as I go along. Not sure if I should summarize what I learn, or just share the links. Still reading!
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
I mean... my reference is "I was alive then and watched that election and campaign in the media and on the internet".
I mean... does nobody _remember_ his campaign?
@wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55 If you really want to dig, you'd want to look for early articles about campaign promised not to take donations, then go to one of the vote data sites and dig through. There should also be media articles from that time mentioning that he'd chose to walk back that promise.
I'm just going off memory, here, and thought it was likely shared cultural memory, but it's possible everyone missed it except the very cynical and alert.
Or I'm crazy.
@AskTheDevil @wolfwoman @NiveusLepus @Smccune55
You’re a lot of things. Crazy isn’t one of them.
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
OK, I'm gonna put this out in small bits as I learn. This has a LOT of info & although I didn't see the fb meme, I recall reading about all of these claims. And I'm going to hashtag now :) #politics
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/beto-orourke-reality-check/
1/
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
#politics
A senior adviser, David Wysong, said that O’Rourke accepted such donations through his first couple of House elections but stopped doing so before seeking his third term in 2016.
2/
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
O’Rourke’s campaign said he doesn’t plan to return the money because individuals wrote the checks. The campaign has not accepted a direct donation from the J Street PAC since O’Rourke made the pledge.
3/
@AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @LnzyHou @Smccune55
Finally, I have to say that I like Beto and nobody is perfect. I learned a lot more about him thanks to your urging. I really, really want Ted Cruz gone! But I'm not in TX nor have I ever lived there, so I'm just a person who cares that someone more decent than Cruz tried hard to beat him. And dear God above, I wish Abbott would just ... vanish. So everything Beto does to help other candidates makes me happy.
4/4
@wolfwoman @AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @Smccune55
#politics Hare on the ground here in her home state of Texas.
I've been watching transphobic commercials from the Republican side of things about how the Dem Challenger to Cruz let boys into girls sports to beat them up.
That's pretty much the whole gist of the ad. At the end there is an obvious male silhouette standing over a girl he's knocked down on a softball field.
It is devoid of all nuance.
@NiveusLepus @AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @Smccune55
Yeah, there's no low too low. Disgusting.
@NiveusLepus @wolfwoman @AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @Smccune55 I saw one in #Ohio yesterday, same sort of garbage. I turned to my computer and gave $50. to #SenatorSherrodBrown
@Superstitionsee @NiveusLepus @AskTheDevil @LnzyHou @Smccune55
I don't have much to donate except my time. It does cost a little to buy postcards & stamps, but aside from monthly to Kamala, my few dollars happen like that!
Otherwise for me, it's mostly #PostcardsToVoters
@wolfwoman @AskTheDevil @NiveusLepus @Smccune55
You don’t say anything about Allred whose running against Cruz. Do you not support him?
I’ve been contributing to Allred campaign for months. That’s how badly I want America to be rid of Cruz.
@LnzyHou @wolfwoman @AskTheDevil @Smccune55 There's so much going on in politics right now, even keeping up with my home state felt overwhelming.
I've heard about Allred myself, and he seems a good alternative to Cruz, all while gaining good ground. He's got a shot, but that's largely all I know about him.
I don't normally do much with politics and have not been a registered member of any party for about 15 or 20 years.
The lack of compassion is both disconcerting and shocking.