Washington, D.C. - {Congressman Joe Donnelly voted in favor of H.R.1538, The Wounded Warrior Assistance Act. The legislation passed the House unanimously and moves to the Senate for their consideration. Donnelly was an original co-sponsor on similar legislation entitled The Dignity for Wounded Warriors Act of 2007 introduced by Congressman Harry Mitchell (D-AZ), chairman of the Veterans Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.
“Voting to provide better resources and staff to ensure high quality care for our service members receiving outpatient care and their families was an easy choice for me,” Donnelly said. “I was angry and disappointed when I heard about the conditions at Walter Reed. It seems like every day, we hear about similar problems across the country. It’s become clear that unnecessary bureaucratic hassles, insufficient oversight and a lack of attention resulted in some of our service members getting inadequate service and having to put up with substandard accommodations. These revelations demanded Congressional action and I’m glad we worked in a bipartisan way to take that action today.”
In response to the conditions at Walter Reed reported by the Washington Post in February, The Wounded Warrior Assistance Act would improve the access to quality medical care and service for wounded service members who are outpatients at military health care facilities and their families.
Some of the key provisions of H.R. 1538 include providing more case workers and patient advocates to assist wounded service members and their families as they receive care. The legislation also improves training of facility personnel in the identification of post-traumatic stress disorder and limiting the number of cases assigned to each caseworker. Further, H.R. 1538 also requires the Department of Defense to establish a hotline for service members and their families to report substandard facilities and provide rapid improvements for substantiated claims.
Additionally, H.R. 1538 takes steps to cut bureaucratic red-tape and improve the transition of wounded service members from the Armed Forces to the VA system. The Wounded Warrior Assistance Act requires an official handoff of medical records by electronic transfer between the Armed Forces and the VA system.
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