Happy Fourth of July (American Independence Day)!

Tomorrow is July 4^th—Independence Day in the United States of America.  This is a time to especially honor both active duty members of our military as well as our veterans.

They put their lives on the line each day to defend the freedoms we too often take for granted.  In this increasingly complicated and violent world, we depend on their skill, training, and knowledge to keep us as safe as possible.  Often, this means going into uncharted territories to carry out dangerous missions.

When they come home they will have battle scars—physical and psychological.  It is often difficult to readjust to civilian life after being away for so long.  From being exposed to bomb blasts and other horrors of war, many soldiers will come home with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and/or Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI).  This will no doubt impact their quality of life.

As a result, they will struggle with any number of debilitating diseases or disorders.  One of these is epilepsy.  This may not appear until several years after a soldier’s military service is over.  Due to brain injury or trauma, the damaged neurons (brain cells) lie dormant until something random causes them to misfire and cause a seizure.  When a person has two or more unprovoked seizures, this is considered epilepsy. 

It may start benignly at first, so you may not even know it is epilepsy.  It may start with a few staring spells or minor jerks, but when the huge tonic-clonic (grand mal) seizure comes, you will know for sure that there is a problem.

This is where our health care system needs to provide for our military.  Unfortunately, for too long, the Veterans Administration (VA) has not done an adequate job in providing for our veterans.  According to a 60 Minutes report (http://www.cbsnews.com/news/secretary-robert-mcdonald-on-cleaning-up-veteran-affairs/ ), for many years, the state VA offices had been altering their records to show better service rates than what was really going on.  In reality, there were wait lists which extended several months for patients to receive care.  They mentioned many vets who have survived several wars, yet had to wait what seemed like forever to receive medical care.

Hopefully, with the new leadership at the VA, things will change for the better.

Here are some resources for veterans who have epilepsy:

http://www.epilepsy.va.gov/index.asp

 As for the overall architecture of the healthcare system, the Affordable Care Act (aka, Obamacare) is not perfect, but it’s the one thing we have right now.  To date, it has insured over 6.4 million (https://www.americanprogress.org/issues/healthcare/report/2015/06/18/115389/fact-sheets-the-state-by-state-effects-of-the-supreme-courts-king-v-burwell-ruling/ ) since the beginning of the Affordable Care Act began.  In addition, if you have a pre-existing condition (like epilepsy), you cannot be turned down for any health insurance plan.  Also, children can stay on their parents’s insurance plan until they reach age 26.  This seems to be a step in the right direction.

I fear, however, that health care companies will try to do anything to protect their bottom line—profits.  That means, even if it makes it more difficult for the patient, they will do almost anything to make as much money as possible, and reward those who help them toward that goal.  I have heard that various healthcare providers are in the process of merging.  This takeover of the market, limiting choices to only two or three options will certainly send costs rising, causing many to be unable to afford healthcare.

So there is still a lot of work to be done to try and fix the law.  I hope the politicians in Washington, D.C. and in the States can work together rather than talk about repealing the law, thereby getting nothing done.

I wonder what our founders would say if they saw us now.  I think they would probably be surprised at how complicated the world has become and overwhelmed at the responsibilities our military has had to take on.  Then, they would be ashamed at how inadequately we have treated our soldiers and veterans once they come home from serving.

This is why we need to have a fully-functioning government in which lawmakers cooperate and compromise to improve the healthcare law we have now.