To receive Mental Health care at a Outpatient Clinic in pennsylvania. He was told he would be unable to get an appointment for six months. When that employee left another va employee lean in to tell the veteran that if he told her he was thinking of killing himself she would be able to get him appointment much sooner in three months instead of six. Luckily that veteran wasnt considering suicide. But what about those veterans who are . How many of the tens of thousands veterans that va admitted have been left on waiting list for weeks, months and even year for care were seeking Mental Health care appointments . House education and Workforce Committee are suicidal or edgeing toward suicide as a result of not getting the care they earned . Despite the increase in budget, program and staff the suicide rate among veterans has remained more or less stable since 1999 with approximately 22 veterans committing suicide every day. The most recent data has shown over the last three years rates of
The hearing will come to order. We are here to discuss the president s fiscal year 2016 budget request for the department of Veterans Affairs. Mr. Secretary, welcome to the committee. Understand that your testimony will be a little bit different today than what we are accustomed to with reference to chart to help us better understand what you are seeing in terms of the challenges that lay ahead and i would say that is indeed a welcome change. So too is the open as you have had with me with members of this committee and this congress about your plans to change the culture at the va. As your testimony illustrates you have been extremely active in visiting va facilities. I think its well over 90 at this point, talking with employees veteran groups in your private sector colleagues with one aim in mind, putting everyones focus squarely on the needs of veterans. Thank you for your willingness to take the job of secretary and thank you for putting everything you have into that job. Turning t
I met a veteran who has been out two years and 10 disability but the point is he cant get his paperwork from dod. What are we doing . We have asked this question for years. Its a great question. I have to say secretary hagel and i are totally aligned that we want to have a seamless handoff from the department of defense to the va. Thats why we have instituted programs like cap while the person is on active duty and allison can talk about that. Congressman brown some good news to report on this front though it didnt obviously help that particular veteran two years ago we are engaged now in the mandatory program for all of our servicemembers including National Guard and reserve for which there are now nearly a million who qualify for benefits that did not previously. Another thing that is starting literally right now is the mandatory separation health assessment. The choice to the veteran told a session is if you are going to make a claim to be a for anything that va will do a complete s
Coming home four times and i think that story was not lost in the film and thats not the story that is selling ticket, right but what we were able to do, what jason was able to do is weave those two together and really spark a dialogue that has caught fire in this country about what it means to go to war but what it means to come home. I thought it raised for the American Public what military veterans go through. The obvious injuries and wounds are seen by everything but it is those conspicuous wounds that often e the ones we deal with in the va and i thought it was great to be able to raise that to the American Public. Rose nick burns and the film american sniper when we return. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following. Additional funding provided by. And by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Rose we begin with president obama and
Coming home four times and i think that story was not lost in the film and thats not the story that is selling ticket, right but what we were able to do, what jason was able to do is weave those two together and really spark a dialogue that has caught fire in this country about what it means to go to war but what it means to come home. I thought it raised for the American Public what military veterans go through. The obvious injuries and wounds are seen by everything but it is those conspicuous wounds that often e the ones we deal with in the va and i thought it was great to be able to raise that to the American Public. Rose nick burns and the film american sniper when we return. Funding for charlie rose is provided by the following. Additional funding provided by. And by bloomberg, a provider of multimedia news and Information Services worldwide. Captioning sponsored by Rose Communications from our studios in new york city, this is charlie rose. Rose we begin with president obama and