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Romano: Why aren't we doing everything possible to help anguished veterans?

 
Published Dec. 21, 2014

The phone rang on the VA hotline last Christmas Day.

The caller was a woman, among the first wave to have served in the U.S. Navy following the passage of the Women's Armed Services Integration Act in 1948.

But that was long ago, and seemingly a world away. Now she was just a lonely figure, beaten down by the years and depressed by what remained.

The crisis team at Bay Pines VA Healthcare System responded immediately. They offered counseling. Support. They set up a plan to check in on her regularly. She seemed to be doing better, and then Easter rolled around and she called again.

It took a while, but they finally tracked her down. She had chosen the Bay Pines complex to carry out a suicide attempt.

Fortunately, help arrived in time to get her to a hospital where, over the course of a month, her recovery was deemed complete.

She's back in her home again and, heaven willing, a few days away from another Christmas morning.

• • •

The actual numbers, everyone seems to agree, are hard to quantify.

Suicide among military personnel — whether active or veteran — is high. Shockingly high? Frighteningly high? Those qualifiers can be debated depending on how you parse the numbers compared to national averages and demographics.

But too high?

That is beyond dispute.

There were 475 suicides among active service members last year. That was triple the number of soldiers lost in combat. Also, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, active military suicides in 2012 were almost twice as high as the general population rate.

The numbers are even more frightening for retired military members. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs estimates 22 veterans kill themselves daily. In other words, a veteran commits suicide nearly every hour of every day.

In the face of those numbers, it seems obvious that we need to do all we can to provide help and services for our military community.

Obvious to everyone but the U.S. Senate, apparently.

Just a few days ago, outgoing Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., blocked a bill that would have provided additional funds for suicide prevention programs for the military.

Coburn, a tea party cheerleader, suggested the VA was too inefficient to be trusted with the $22 million the bill would provide. If you're wondering, the bill represents one-thousandth of 1 percent of the money already spent on the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

What would the money have provided?

It would have recruited new psychiatrists by setting up a fund to repay college loans if they agreed to go to work in the Veterans Health Administration. It would have strengthened the peer support system already in place. It would have helped people such as Patricia Frederick save lives.

Frederick has been the suicide prevention coordinator at Bay Pines for the past five years. She leads a small team of licensed clinical social workers who facilitate services for veterans in emotional distress in the Tampa Bay area.

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When veterans call the national crisis hotline (1-800-273-8255, press 1 for veterans), a counselor determines whether they are in need of immediate intervention and responds appropriately. No matter the severity of the call, the information is passed on to local VA centers to follow up on.

Frederick's team responded to more than 900 calls in the past fiscal year. The number of calls in the first month of the current year already topped any single month of last year.

For veterans, the triggers can be the same as anyone else. Financial or family problems, for instance. Unfortunately, there are also issues dealing with disabilities or pain associated with combat injuries. Emotional issues from witnessing war's horrors. Survivor's guilt. A lost sense of purpose or camaraderie.

"A lot of them are just feeling helpless, and they're not sure there is a solution for them out there,'' Frederick said. "You want to show them that there is reason for hope. That their lives do matter, and that we're here to help them in any way we can.''

It is heartbreaking to think so many of our veterans are in such distress.

It's far worse to realize we're not doing everything we can for them.