A marine who lost part of his skull battling the VA who said he had no brain damage

[MORTARDUDE]

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http://www.cnn.com/2007/HEALTH/11/15...ine/index.html



WASHINGTON, Illinois (CNN) -- Ty Ziegel peers from beneath his Marine Corps baseball cap, his once boyish face burned beyond recognition by a suicide bomber's attack in Iraq just three days before Christmas 2004.


Ty Ziegel, a Marine, was badly wounded in Iraq. He battled the VA over disability benefits when he returned.

1 of 3 more photos » He lost part of his skull in the blast and part of his brain was damaged. Half of his left arm was amputated and some of the fingers were blown off his right hand.

Ziegel, a 25-year-old Marine sergeant, knew the dangers of war when he was deployed for his second tour in Iraq.

But he didn't expect a new battle when he returned home as a wounded warrior: a fight with the Department of Veterans Affairs.

"Sometimes, you get lost in the system," he told CNN. "I feel like a Social Security number. I don't feel like Tyler Ziegel."

His story is one example of how medical advances in the battlefield have outpaced the home front. Many wounded veterans return home feeling that the VA system, specifically its 62-year-old disability ratings system, has failed them. Watch Ziegel display his model skull »

"The VA system is not ready, and they simply don't have time to catch up," Tammy Duckworth -- herself a wounded veteran who heads up the Illinois Department of Veteran Affairs -- told the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee in March.

VA Acting Secretary Gordon Mansfield said cases like Ziegel's are rare -- that the majority of veterans are moving through the process and "being taken care of." He also said most veterans are fairly compensated.

"Any veteran with the same issue, if it's a medical disability, ... it is going to get the same exact result anywhere in our system," he said.


Waging War on the VA
CNN's Dr. Sanjay Gupta investigates the shocking reality of what happens to the nation's wounded warriors when they return home.
Saturday and Sunday, 8 p.m. ET

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More than 28,500 troops have been wounded in Operation Iraqi Freedom, including about 8,500 that have needed air transport, according to the U.S. military. See photos of these Iraq war heroes »

A recent Harvard study found that the cost of caring for those wounded over the course of their lifetime could ultimately cost more than $660 billion.

In Ziegel's case, he spent nearly two years recovering at Brooke Army Medical Center in Texas. Once he got out of the hospital, he was unable to hold a job. He anticipated receiving a monthly VA disability check sufficient to cover his small-town lifestyle in Washington, Illinois.

Instead, he got a check for far less than expected. After pressing for answers, Ziegel finally received a letter from the VA that rated his injuries: 80 percent for facial disfigurement, 60 percent for left arm amputation, a mere 10 percent for head trauma and nothing for his left lobe brain injury, right eye blindness and jaw fracture.

"I don't get too mad about too many things," he said. "But once we've been getting into this, I'm ready to beat down the White House door if I need to."

"I'm not expecting to live in the lap of luxury," he added. "But I am asking them to make it comfortable to raise a family and not have to struggle."

Within 48 hours of telling his story to CNN this summer, the Office of then-VA Secretary Jim Nicholson acted on Ziegel's case. The VA changed his head trauma injury, once rated at 10 percent, to traumatic brain injury rated at 100 percent, substantially increasing his monthly disability check.

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Duckworth, the Illinois VA chief, knows exactly what Ziegel and other severely wounded vets are going through. She lost both her legs when a rocket-propelled grenade struck her Blackhawk helicopter on November 12, 2004. Her right arm was also shattered. Watch how Duckworth's wounds changed her life »

She told CNN she received "incredible care" at Walter Reed for 13 months, but soon realized the transition to the VA wouldn't be as smooth.

"I started worrying about the fact that maybe this country won't remember in five years that there are these war wounded," Duckworth said.

Garrett Anderson with the Illinois National Guard, for example, has been fighting the VA since October 15, 2005. Shrapnel tore through his head and body after a roadside bomb blew up the truck he was driving. He lost his right arm.

The VA initially rejected his claim, saying his severe shrapnel wounds were "not service connected." Watch Anderson describe "my arm was hanging there" »

"Who would want to tell an Iraqi or Afghanistan soldier who was blown up by an IED that his wounds were not caused by his service over there?" said Anderson's wife, Sam.

After pressure from Sen. Dick Durbin of Illinois, the VA acted on Anderson's case. He has since been awarded compensation for a traumatic brain injury.

"It upsets me that the VA system operates in a way that it takes people of power -- and who you know and what you know -- to get what you want," said Anderson, who is now retired.

When asked about Anderson's case specifically, the VA's Mansfield said such cases make him "more dedicated" to fixing the system.

In July, President Bush and a commission appointed to review the care of veterans returning from war announced the need for a complete overhaul of the disability ratings system, which dates back to World War II. The VA is now considering action on the commission's recommendations.

Ziegel eventually won his battle. Still he feels for so many others he believes are getting cheated by the system.

"We're feeding the war machine, but you never think of the war machine that comes home and needs, you know, feeding back home," he said.

His family hopes they don't have to fight the VA again. In August, Ty Ziegel's brother, 22-year-old Zach Ziegel, was deployed to Iraq.

"I want to make the VA system better because if he has to go through anything I went through, that's really going to upset me. That'll make my fuse real short and hot," Ty Ziegel said. E-mail to a friend

[Boats]

Mort - it's a shame these kids have to go through this conflict and then to be treated so badly after the fact. I respect that young man for his endurance and ability to work through his handicap. He doesn't want any sympathy rather - just get on with his life the best he can. His attitude is good now I can only hope he doesn't have any set backs that would impact his current outlook on life. The whole CNN special was good and very daming of the system.

I can only hope more of these kids get the attention they need for the rest of their lives.

[Packo]

This is the kind of stuff that makes it so difficult for me to control my BP. I don't have to read it to know it's just one more GI getting the shaft. It will never end.

Pack

[reconeil]

Pack,
Longtime disgust with both Veteran & civilian beaurocrats aside,
seems to me that America's Wounded would get a better deal or
much better treatment from The IRAQI or AFGHAN Veterans Affairs,
...if there are such an agencies over there?

Neil

[MORTARDUDE]

I watched the CNN special twice. The part with the VA employee's name being cut out so it couldn't be traced back to him / her, was the lowest of the low. That employee, if he indeed did do that, should be reprimanded and a note put in his official personnel folder. I had heard that the VA, as a matter of course, will always "lowball" someone when they file the first time for a service related claim. Maybe the "logic" is that someone will accept a lower amount and just go away, and others will fight and give up later. It is time that this whole disgusting system dating back to 1946 be changed once and for all !! Give a serviceman or woman what they deserve the first time so they do not have to be demeaned or embarassed to ask for what the country PROMISED them in the first place.

Larry

[reconeil]

Larry,
Well Stated,...even though must disagree about that 1946 time frame given.

Believe it was about 1960 when VA got as bloated with bureaucrats, lawyers, politicians & political appointees, and much like The U.S. Government,...and started acting more so like an Adversarial Civilian Claims Adjusting Company, than anything else.

I say so since neither of my older relatives (one injured with:"The Fighting SeaBees" in Pacific & one injured 1945 during M4 Sherman Tank training, and myself later as a 21 year old dischargee in 1958,...needed no Reps or Legal Assistance to RIGHTFULLY GET WHAT DUE.
I merely went by myself to The Newark Regional Office of The VA for being physically examed. Don't remember even filling out any forms. Just did a lot of signing.

In general, didn't have to waste PRECIOUS TIME (Maladies get worse and not better, if not quickly attended to or treated.), and especially & absurdly proving what Military Records HAVE ALREADY PROVED.

Regardless, could never understand why later Fellow Americans would make careers out of making things more difficult than should ever need be for The U.S. Military & Disabled Veterans? Maybe, just maybe,...the more money that The Military & DAVs can get screwed-out-of and/or held back from by bureacrats,...the more blue, silver or gold stars little people will accumulate on their little Report Cards, is what it's all about?

Hey,...you never know.
Besides, I figure my guess at why lawyers do what they do,...is a good anyones.

Neil

[MORTARDUDE]

In the CNN program, the VA heads being interviewed, refer to the out of date ( about 1946 ) information being used to rate wounded servicmen and women, as something that needs to be changed. They did not volunteer a way, or even the enthusiasm to do it though.

Larry

Originally Posted by reconeil

Larry,
Well Stated,...even though must disagree about that 1946 time frame given.

Believe it was about 1960 when VA got as bloated with bureaucrats, lawyers, politicians & political appointees, and much like The U.S. Government,...and started acting more so like an Adversarial Civilian Claims Adjusting Company, than anything else.

I say so since neither of my older relatives (one injured with:"The Fighting SeaBees" in Pacific & one injured 1945 during M4 Sherman Tank training, and myself later as a 21 year old dischargee in 1958,...needed no Reps or Legal Assistance to RIGHTFULLY GET WHAT DUE.
I merely went by myself to The Newark Regional Office of The VA for being physically examed. Don't remember even filling out any forms. Just did a lot of signing.

In general, didn't have to waste PRECIOUS TIME (Maladies get worse and not better, if not quickly attended to or treated.), and especially & absurdly proving what Military Records HAVE ALREADY PROVED.

Regardless, could never understand why later Fellow Americans would make careers out of making things more difficult than should ever need be for The U.S. Military & Disabled Veterans? Maybe, just maybe,...the more money that The Military & DAVs can get screwed-out-of and/or held back from by bureacrats,...the more blue, silver or gold stars little people will accumulate on their little Report Cards, is what it's all about?

Hey,...you never know.
Besides, I figure my guess at why lawyers do what they do,...is a good anyones.

Neil

[exlrrp]

I'm not getting this--They already gave him:
80% for facial disfigurement
60% left arm loss
10% head trauma

That totals up to 150%--why would he be getting less than 100% disability pay?
Why would he need more than that to get the full 100%

just curious
Happy Thanksgiving
James

[Jerry D]

Its called VA mathmatics where you take the total and average it I think he originally was averaged at 60% now with his head trauma its to the full 100% full disability.

[Stick]

Department of Veterans Affairs bureaucratic math.
100% - 80% leaves the veteran 20% able, 60% of that 20% ability is 12% bringing the disability to 92%, now you take another 10% from that 92% and it comes out less than 1% but the DVA is gratuitous and rounds the figure up an additional 1% bringing the total of all disabilities to 93%. The veteran is entitled to a 90% disability rating until he reaches the age of 50 at which point the unwritten 50+%, 50 years old rule MIGHT kick in and would bring him to 100% total and permanent providing that there have been no changes in the rating for the prior ten years.