* VA and DoD should monitor and report on the positive post-combat, post-deployment, and post-military outcomes of our veterans. For example, new businesses started by cheap tiffany key ring, higher wages earned by veterans, diplomas earned by veterans, increased homeownership among veterans, and other signs of a vibrant post-war adjustment to civilian life.
* VCS provides additional examples of the cost of war at the end of our statement. The important statistics were summarized by reporters in the article, "The Numbers," published last weekend by the Fayetteville Observer.
Part Two: Need for Trust Fund and National Plan
VCS believes cheap tiffany money clip must learn from the past so we do not repeat mistakes. VCS endorses the Vietnam Veterans of America, when they remind us that, "Never again shall one generation of veterans abandon another." This is why Veterans for Common Sense fully endorses the proposal by Linda Bilmes and Joseph Stiglitz to create a Trust Fund to make sure our veterans receive the healthcare and benefits they earned.
As a non-profit advocacy organization, VCS uses the Freedom of Information Act to obtain data from DoD and VA to monitor and publicize the needs of our veterans. VCS was honored to provide our data to Linda Bilmes and Joseph Stiglitz for their book, The Three Trillion Dollar War: The True Cost of the Iraq Conflict (2008). In their ground-breaking cheap tiffany necklace on the subject of the cost of war, Bilmes and Stiglitz called for the creation of "A Veterans Benefit Trust Fund . . . so that veterans' health and disability entitlements are fully funded as obligations occur." In their book, the experts stated:
There are always pressures to cut unfunded entitlements. So, when new military recruits are hired, the money required to fund future health care and disability benefits should be set aside ("lockboxed") in a new Veterans Benefit Trust Fund. We require private employers to do this; we should require the armed forces to do it as cheap tiffany pendant. This would mean, of course, that when we go to war, we have to set aside far large amounts for future health care and disability costs, as these will inevitably rise significantly during and after any conflict ("Reform 12," page 200).
The issue of establishing a Trust Fund is timely because we have now endured nine years of war in Afghanistan, and seven years of conflict in Iraq. In 1995, Congress was forced to intervene and appropriate $3 billion in emergency funding for VA. One of the main reasons cited by VA for the funding crisis was the unexpected and unanticipated flood of Iraq and cheap tiffany ring war veterans. Thanks to the strong pro-veteran leadership of Senator Patty Murray, the daughter of a war veteran, VA was given additional resources to meet the tidal wave of new, first-time Iraq and Afghanistan war veteran patients flooding into VA.
In order for VA and DoD to properly manage the human and financial cost of providing medical care for our casualties, more robust data must be collected and analyzed immediately by the Administration, Congress, academics, and advocates.
* VA must be able to answer simple, tiffany sale questions. For example, what is the total number of unique deployed Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who have received any VA benefit (healthcare, disability, etc.) since returning home? In another example, is VA able to accurately and consistently provide the expenditures for all of these VA programs? VCS remains alarmed VA is incapable and unwilling to answer these two easy questions.
* DoD and VA cheap tiffany bangle an official accounting of the financial costs for medical care, disability benefits, education benefits, life insurance, home loan guaranty, and all other DoD and VA benefits for servicemembers, veterans, and families. For the past several years, VCS has requested this information from VA using the Freedom of Information Act. VA has not provided any cost data. Starting in 2001, VA employees urged VA leaders to begin tracking war-related benefit use and costs, and nearly all requests were refused.
* DoD must provide an accounting of all discharges by type and branch of service, sorted by year, to monitor trends for both deployed and non-deployed servicemembers since 1990. Two prior cheap tiffany bracelet by this Committee documented tens of thousands of improper discharges, often for veterans at high risk of readjustment challenges due to TBI and PTSD. As the number of less than fully honorable discharges increases, additional highly vulnerable veterans flood into society. Many of these veterans either don't seek VA assistance or are refused VA help, instead turning to private, state, local, or university campus programs for assistance that should have been provided by the Federal government.
* VA should monitor negative post-deployment outcomes, such as homelessness, suicides, divorce, and crime, as well as state, local, and private expenditures on veterans. The most important oversight remains the Administration's inability to provide complete and accurate active duty, Reserve, National Guard, and veteran cheap tiffany cufflink data. Every year DoD has set new, and highly disturbing, records of active duty suicides. Most of the initial monitoring began with FOIA requests from advocacy organizations or journalists investigating patterns of disturbing developments such as suicides, homicides, unemployment, and homelessness. VA and DoD only began limited monitoring and research after repeated advocacy organization, media, and Congressional inquiries.
* The Department of Labor should monitor unemployment and underemployment, both for veterans and families. Veterans often move from the military installation to their home town shortly after cheap tiffany earring. Often, these cross-country moves uproot spouses from their jobs. The use of the Post-9/11 GI Bill, legislation introduced by Senator Jim Webb of Virginia, by hundreds of thousands of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans may be masking already alarming reports of high unemployment among returning veterans.
Testimony by Paul Sullivan, Executive Director, Veterans for Common Sense
Veterans for Common Sense (tiffany key ring on sale) thanks Committee Chairman Filner, Ranking Member Buyer, and Members of the House Veterans' Affairs Committee for inviting us to testify about "The True Cost of War," and the consequences of the Iraq and Afghanistan conflicts. We are honored to be in the company of experts, advocates, and fellow veterans to discuss this important long-term issue.
VCS begins by presenting the Committee with the most salient official tiffany money clip on sale statistics about the human and social costs of the current conflicts. Our top priority for this hearing is to inform Congress, the press, and the American public about the human cost of the Iraq and Afghanistan wars because everyone in our country is impacted by high taxes, spending, and lost opportunity costs caused by war.
As of March 2010, government statistics show 565,000 new veteran patients were treated at Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) hospitals and clinics since 2001. As of today, based on an average of 9,000 new patients each month, VCS estimates the current count of VA patients is approximately 619,000.
The significant post-tiffany necklace on sale statistics about our veterans must be contrasted with events during 2002, when the Administration had no casualty estimate, no plan to monitor or estimate fatal or non-fatal casualties, no plan for caring for non-fatal casualties, and no dedicated long-term funding for non-fatal casualties.
The consequences of the war are high, especially for non-fatal casualties. There is a general lack of awareness about the hundreds of thousands of post-deployment casualties. And there appears to be a lack of urgency tiffany necklace on sale adequately and promptly meet our veterans' growing needs. Therefore, VCS urges Congress to pass a new law mandating that the Administration must estimate, monitor, plan, and fund healthcare and disability benefits for our casualties before starting or entering into a war.
VCS broadly defines casualty. This includes battlefield deaths, and caring for our grieving families. Casualty includes our servicemembers who become wounded, injured, or ill on the battlefield as well as during training. This includes post-war medical conditions among our veterans not immediately tiffany ring on sale while in the military, such as toxic exposures, traumatic brain injury, and mental health conditions.
Part One: Official Statistics
Government statistics paint a disturbing picture of enormous human suffering among our servicemembers and veterans. VCS obtained the following facts from the Department of Defen
won: "We're so pleased to support Youth Net, which is helping to fill the huge service gap for young people with mental health problems," says Today's Parent editor-in-tiffany jewellery on sale Caroline Connell.
What the money means: "This award will fund our Pens & Paint program, a 10-week activity run by youth with a background in creative expression and mental health," says Jessica Ripley, program coordinator at Youth Net. "Through this wonderful program, kids learn to cope with stress constructively - through social interaction, visual arts and creative writing."
To investigate the prevalence and correlates of missed opportunities for addressing reproductive and mental health needs during patients' visits to primary healthcare facilities. We tiffany bangle on sale a random sample of participants from 14 of the 49 clinics in Cape Town's public health sector using stratified, cluster random sampling ( n = 2618). Participants were screened to identify those at risk for unsafe sexual behavior and a mental disorder (specifically substance use, depression, anxiety, and suicide). Information pertaining to whether or not respondents were asked about these issues during clinic visits during the previous year was elicited. The rates and correlates of missed opportunities for providing reproductive and mental health interventions were calculated. The criteria of a strict definition of a missed opportunity for reproductive or mental health care information were fulfilled by 25% of the sample, while 46% met criteria for a looser definition. tiffany bracelet on sale adjusting for the effects of other variables in the model, men and Colored respondents were more likely to have satisfied the definition of a missed opportunity for an intervention, while having completed high school and having children increased the likelihood of receiving an intervention. Consultations with primary healthcare providers in which these issues are not discussed may represent missed opportunities. Persons presenting for routine care can be counseled, screened and, if required, treated. tiffany cufflink on sale are needed at the patient, provider, and community levels to increase the opportunities to provide reproductive and mental health care to patients during routine visits.
There is a general lack of awareness about the hundreds of thousands of post-deployment casualties. [...] there appears to be a lack of urgency to adequately and promptly meet tiffany earring on sale veterans' growing needs. [...] VCS urges Congress to pass a new law mandating that the Administration must estimate, monitor, plan, and fund healthcare and disability benefits for our casualties before starting or entering into a war. According to DoD: * At the end of August 2010, a total of 5,670 U.S. servicemembers died in the Iraq War and Afghanistan War combat zones. * At the end of August 2010, a total of 91,384 U.S. servicemembers in the two war zones were wounded or were medically evacuated due to injuries or illnesses that could not be treated in the war zones. * The grand total of U.S. battlefield casualties is more than 97,000.
Typically, it's a parent who first recognizes that his child might have a mental health problem. But teachers are the ones sounding the alarm in about 16 percent of cases. And yet, only nine percent of frank gehry jewellery said that school personnel were their most helpful source of support. Teachers may be on the front line with kids, but they lack the training and resources needed to support kids and families affected by mental illness. Anderson adds that without better bridging between home and school, extra training and programs will not be effective. Many parents she speaks with report having negative experiences with their children's schools, and say their kids feel most discriminated against at school. "You can't just work with the child," she says. "If we're going to do something with schools, let's try and engage families."
Sadly, the stigma lives on
Parents whose kids have mental paloma picasso jewellery often feel judged; more than threequarters believe that most people see their children's difficulties as the result of the family environment (44 percent) or a "negative personality" (32 percent). Despite increasing public awareness about children's mental health, families do not feel that their kids' struggles are understood as real illnesses that need and deserve to be treated. Which is why paediatrician and parent Carlson-Reid believes that we need to keep talking about the issue. "Nobody's immune from the possibility of mental illness," she says.
At Youth Net, people between the ages of 18 and 30 talk to kids return to tiffany jewellery mental illness and connect them with professionals. They also snowboard, hike and practise yoga with them. "Kids are surprised to learn that up to 25 percent of people have mental illness, and it can be as common as test anxiety or social phobia at school," [LAURA ARMSTRONG] says. "They don't realize that other young people can relate to what they feel and can help them through the darkness."
When Laura Armstrong was 10 years old, a friend in her Ottawa neighbourhood grabbed a knife and threatened suicide. "She had lost her mom and was distraught," recalls tiffany 1837 jewellery. A few years later, another pal confided in Armstrong about her plan to jump off a bridge. Armstrong gave her friend two options: Call Kids Help Phone or meet with her high school guidance counsellor.
Today Armstrong is a doctoral student in clinical psychology at the University of Ottawa, and mom to one-year-old Keriana. As part of her studies, she did a clinical placement at Youth Net, a peer support organization for youth with mental health problems. "Only one in six youth who need mental health services ever gets them in Canada, and this organization is working to boost that statistic," Armstrong says.
At Youth Net, people between the ages of 18 and 30 talk to kids about mental illness and connect them with professionals. They also snowboard, hike and practise yoga with them. "Kids are surprised to learn tiffany somerset jewellery up to 25 percent of people have mental illness, and it can be as common as test anxiety or social phobia at school," Armstrong says. "They don't realize that other young people can relate to what they feel and can help them through the darkness."
Discussion
The findings from our systematic review on the pathways to care of patients with FEP suggest that the type of contact differs depending on whether the first contact or the referral source is considered. These contact points represent different time-periods in the course of illness, and may suggest a failure to identify previously untreated patients with psychotic return to tiffany presenting to a general practitioner. This could be because the symptoms are subtle, the assessment contact is too brief, or the presentation of a psychotic disorder is an infrequent event in a general practice. The care pathways also differed by geographical region, probably because of differences in social, cultural, and health service contexts. These regional trends highlight the need for tiffany 1837 that is specific to the jurisdiction of interest.
Our findings support prior claims that involuntary and negative pathways to care, such as with police or emergency services, are frequent for patients with FEP (Garety & Rigg, 2001). This is of particular concern given that negative pathways to care may be associated with poor engagement in treatment (Compton, 2005) and greater dissatisfaction with services (Bhugra et al. 2004). Qualitative research on help-seeking in FEP also indicates that negative experiences with psychiatric tiffany somerset may have an impact on future delays in help-seeking (Monteiro et al. 2006). Taken together, these findings suggest that we need to pay greater attention to the potentially deleterious impact of the involvement of police, ambulance, and emergency services on the pathway to care.
Contacts with non-physicians tended to be infrequent relative to contacts with physicians and emergency services, except in some specific Asian jurisdictions. tiffanys et al. (1998) suggest that non-physician contacts may be involved as part of a 'parallel help-seeking strategy', which would not be captured by the indices used by the included studies. Qualitative research on help-seeking in early psychosis indicates that non-physician contacts play an important role in linking the families of patients with psychiatric services (Wong, 2007 a , b ) and families may use personal contacts as resources to expedite the help-seeking process (Bergner et al. 2008). There is also evidence that patients tend to under-report contact with non-physician services, possibly because of the perception that informal contacts do not warrant equal status on the help-seeking pathway (Lincoln & McGorry, 1995).
The studies that explored the sex, tiffany bangles uk-economic, or ethnic determinants of the pathways to care had conflicting findings, probably reflective of contextual differences across studies. In addition, the objective of the included studies was generally not to explore the sociodemographic determinants of the pathway to care, but rather to use these variables as covariates for other analyses. Of exception, several studies did focus on ethnic differences as the primary objective. The included studies were also limited in their power to explore these determinants, and future research may obtain a better understanding from studies that are designed and powered to examine the sociodemographic determinants of the pathway to care.