By Dorothy Meindok
The Post Newspaper Veterans Consultant
This week, I want to cover the Veterans Administration’s veteran registries, share information many veterans should know about and provide resources as to where to go to learn more to get qualified help and more information about veteran healthcare registries and exams. Registries are a topic closely associated with laws like the PACT Act, the Agent Orange Act and even the Veterans Claims Assistance Act, indirectly. Registries provide patient education, prevention and research that support veterans as a whole and sometimes, by engaging in learning more, can help an eligible veterans’ personal claim before the VA in the process.
I encourage all eligible veterans to contact their local Veterans Health Administration’s Office of Patient Care Services. VA Public Health has critical responsibilities of promoting health and preventing disease among Veterans and they work very hard to get the job done. These professionals develop evidence-based public health policy, conduct operations research, and perform educational outreach that serves individual veterans who participate while also providing data that helps form better healthcare treatments for all veterans. Their research and findings are relied upon by many medical, scientific, and legal professionals, government, and elected officials, both inside and outside of VA, when deciding what is service related. The results and publications of their work product often supports legislative pushes to make certain exposures and diseases “presumptive” under VA and federal laws. They educate and study our affected veteran population while providing cutting edge medical resources, innovative treatments, patient education and assistance along the way.
What makes a veteran eligible is dependent on where and how they served. If they did not serve in a particular location or in a specific set of duties, the veteran may not be found eligible to register because they are not part and parcel of the purposes for which the registry exists, which makes sense.
Registries have been a part of veterans’ health care for decades. The first registry was the Agent Orange registry which, once past the social stigma of what our Vietnam Veterans were relegated to endure upon returning home, has aided those veterans and our government in better understanding of the service-connected health issues our warriors faced, helping support the gradual and eventual changes needed to afford Vietnam Veterans proper healthcare and benefits. The published findings have aided in creating awareness and laws to better support and protect them. One decades long and Congressionally-supported study known today as the National Academy of Sciences Veterans & Agent Orange Update, a biennial report that has been furnished to the public arena, has aided our VA and nation in providing scientific/medical study results analyzed and interpreted by world-renowned professionals in the fields of study to create a list of “presumptives” under VA law that removes, often insurmountable obstacles to establish service connected disability. The PACT Act provides for collaboration between these professional communities for the next generation of veterans, post-Vietnam war. (Thank you Vietnam Veterans and concerned Americans for providing a blueprint.)
By visiting VA.gov and searching “Environmental Health Coordinator,” a veteran can find out who to contact to determine eligibility & schedule a registry exam for Agent Orange, Burn Pit or other suspected toxic exposures and hazards including the ever-elusive Gulf War illnesses that often must overcome worldwide, published claims that no weapons of mass destruction existed or were used. We may never know the whole truth of the matter, but veterans affected still deserve care, nonetheless. To find that thousands upon thousands suffer the same ill effects is simply a concerted conspiracy theory fails logic, it is obvious that “something” affected Gulf War veterans.
Over the years, and not necessarily in Texas, veterans who have asked for registry enrollment have been told that it isn’t necessary and therefore they did not need to enroll or participate because it wouldn’t help their claims. I beg to differ. Conceding and agreeing with VA that there is no direct relationship to a registry participant in VA’s provision of services or awarding benefits because it is true, that is not a direct purpose of registries. There is benefit to the veteran via patient education and awareness alone, making participation worth the time and effort, it also helps other veterans in the process and in some cases helps to establish collaborative evidence that can be used to support an individual veteran’s claim as an added bonus where complete records may not be available.
My awareness of this began with helping combat, intelligence and special operative veterans that were exposed to health dangers during the Persian Gulf War, subsequent wars, and conflicts. Not surprisingly, during military operations in a verified zone, administrative functions that are the normal course of business that, otherwise, sometimes fall short because documentation is lost, accidentally destroyed or in some instances the person responsible for that recording8 perishes taking a whole unit’s information with them.
That often translated to issues in providing the Veterans Benefits Administration with needed evidence that an event took place or sometimes, that the veteran was even present at a particular location or involved in a situation that they now claim is connected to a claimed health disability. Sometimes VBA is not furnished with all the records because they simply do not exist or are subjected to classifications far above the VBA team’s clearances. Understanding that only veterans with specific service and exposures are entitled to register in each registry, one thing that being eligible to register and undergo an associated exam can help establish is that, at the very least, the veteran was present in a zone that the registry exists for, otherwise the veteran would not be allowed to enroll in the registry or be afforded a registry exam. VA Law is premised upon weighing alternative evidence where the veteran is given the benefit of any doubt and if no direct records exist or can be furnished for a specific veteran, the fact that they are eligible to enroll in a closed registry provides confidence a VBA adjudication team can rely on that the veteran was, more likely than not, present within a theater of conflict or exposure. It’s the power and positive use of “circumstantial evidence.”
So, in my opinion as a veteran and lawyer, registries, and participation in them, are important in overall VA healthcare, benefits administration and most importantly, individual patient awareness and education.
If you are eligible, take the time to participate and contact your VA healthcare facility, enroll, and ask for your exam. You owe it to yourself to be a warrior because you are worth it and your brothers & sisters are worth it too.
Next week, I’ll share some stories, tips and red flags associated with choosing an advocate to meet a veteran’s needs. Have a great Sunday and see you then.
Here’s a link to VA’s Public Health Website page that provides detailed information and contacts to get started: https://www.publichealth.va.gov/exposures/coordinators.asp
More information –
Agent Orange Registry Exams: https://www.publichealth.va.gov/exposures/agentorange/benefits/registry-exam.asp
Airborne Hazards and Open Burn Pit Registry Exams:
www.publichealth.va.gov/exposures/publications/gulf-war/gulf-war-winter-2017/burn-pit-registry.asp
(Also available via VA’s MyHealtheVet portal):
www.myhealth.va.gov/mhv-portal-web/ss20210222-airborne-hazards-open-burn-pit-registry
Dorothy Meindok is The Post Newspaper’s Veterans Consultant. Ms. Meindok served her nation in the United States Navy and is currently a practicing lawyer advocating for our nation’s veterans. Her column appears on Sundays.
