I am a patient at the Palo Alto VA Health Center, and from at least these "boots on the ground", I can confirm that Palo Alto is generally good with out-patient care, and outstanding with in-patient care.

It gets a bit longer to see specialists, Dermatology is an obvious example at about 2 months to get an appointment, but most others are much better.

A friend has been waiting for 2 1/2 years to get his knees fixed at the VA!
He is in constant pain and walks with great difficulty. When the weather is cold, hardly at all. He says he now has an advocate who talked to him last year. Not good enough! He is decorated Viet Nam vet with PTSD and a ruined body and nobody cares! He should be at least 80% Service Connected for disability benefits from the VA. How sad!!! When I have time to advocate for him they better duck!

That the govt. should stay out of any and all business. When govt. gets too big for it's britches corruption and waste is the only outcome.

Look at Kaiser, their doctors can see you whenever you want. If you have something that is bad, they will take care of it right away or as soon as their facility can handle you. If you need to contact your doctor, you can email them and they will respond back within the day. Now that is service.

The VA plays games buy having lists of people on the waiting game that gets them more money. It's a shame.

@Susan: Is this an issue specifically with the Palo Alto VA?

@Just: Really? Really? Have you even bothered to observe what happens in the private-sector healthcare system? Or are you that brainwashed?

While I am not eligible for VA care, I have several relatives who are and have been in the Palo Alto VA as both in-patients and out-patients. I agree with SteveH who said "Palo Alto is generally good with out-patient care, and outstanding with in-patient care." We should be very proud and thankful for this facility.

VA Palo Alto is hit and miss. I had to wait 6-months for an MRI of my shattered ankle, and then another 2 months to get the film read. PAMF did it and read it the same day under my wife's coverage and came up with a completely different (and correct) diagnosis. The VA primarily serves the people who work at the VA. They tell you when your only appointment option day and time is. If you have a work schedule, good luck in getting an appointment that works. In fact, the VA would much rather develop in its patients a welfare mentality whereby you can't afford to work in order to receive it's substandard treatment. And good luck with parking. Plan on spending a whole day there for poor quality medical care. Everyone else, take a number and get ready for a long wait.

DOCTORS ARE BEING BULLIED BY DEA, PATIENTS ARE BEING CRIMINALIZED, THE DEA SECURES THEIR OWN JOB SECURITY WHILE FILLING THE COFFERS OF CORRUPT 3 LETTER AGENCY'S AND ALL THE WHILE AT THE EXPENSE OF THE VETERAN WHO SACRIFICED HIS WELL BEING FOR YOU ALL IN THE FIRST PLACE, ALL THIS TO ENSURE THE PERPETUATION OF WAR BE CONSTANT AND ENDLESS. READ ON.

All doctors that prescribe medication are issued a DEA number by the Drug Enforcement Agency. This DEA number helps the Drug Enforcement Agency monitor types and amounts of narcotic medicines a doctor prescribes. You will see this DEA number on all doctors written prescriptions. If the DEA feels a doctor is prescribing to many pain medicines the DEA will warn the doctor that they are over prescribing which if goes on unchecked inevitably leads to a revoking of the doctors license to practice medicine. Due to this DEA's bullying style approach few if any doctors speak out against such demands if not out of sheer fear of losing their license to practice, then for taking the path of least resistance by requiring their patients to taper off their pain meds or quit them all together. This all occurs even though the patient has had legitimate pain and the medical documentation to support that fact along with the need to manage their pain through the use of pain medications. (Note: We have used the word, "bullying" because we know that the dosage of pain medicine a patient should be prescribed is for the doctor / patient relationship to determine, it is not the DEA's position to manage a patients pain medicine dosage as is what appears to be happening indirectly in many cases.) Needless to say the doctor is bound from providing proper care to his patients, the patient is medically abused as a result and feels criminalized for asking for legitimate and rightful pain medicines.

With the doctor incapable of telling the DEA where to stick it and the patient not being properly cared for this all places much unwanted strain upon the doctor/patient relationship and in more cases than not relations end with the patient seeking out a new doctor in hopes of finding no such trouble. But this too becomes a failure because less than six months into pain management with his new doctor the patient begins to witness the same thing take place. This time the patient understands clearly that he can no longer get the care that is needed from a system run by a bullying drug mob agency and so instead of going through this same cycle again the patient begins to get relief at the street level. It is at this moment that the perpetuation of war begins. For not only will the patient be susceptible to high health risks through dirty meds, he at times will have to risk guessing his dosage, coupled with the risk of arrest and subsequent incarceration for seeking medicine on the street. What is worst of all is that all the money that patient spends on the street is a direct funding of the Cartels, Terrorists, and ISIS's. Hence we see how the current system delivers a mass pool of people hooked on irregular, dirty and risky drugs who are constantly funding the perpetuation of a war while at the same time keeping our prison systems over flowing, a multitude of families become completely wrecked as a result and all the while securing the dysfunctional public model that guarantees DEA job security and massive market growth through securing the illegal drug trade for ever more. What's more is this is a direct sponsorship of such perverse organizations as the corrupt 3 letter agencies that we clearly can see feeds off their own.

I am 70% combat disabled, have lost my physician of 18 years due to this bullshit, no longer have ANY health care let alone the care my government promised to me via the VA, an feel completely let down by my nation and people.


The perpetuation of War, ensuring DEA job security, criminalizing the patient and the subsequent decapitation of the doctors ability to actually provide veterans with proper pain care.