Physical Well-Being

MECHANICSVILLE, Va. -- Local veterans, their families, and federal leaders came together at the Mechanical American Legion Post Thursday to celebrate an "innovative" program that gives disabled veterans the ability to control their own care.  The Veterans-Directed Home and Community Based Services (VDHCBS) program allows disabled veterans to live in their own homes instead of nursing homes.

This Saturday marks Veterans Day, when Americans pay respect to those who have served in the armed forces. But it also marks an opportunity to highlight the issues most important to military families—and few are quite as significant as the persistent holes in medical care and socioeconomic ills which afflict veterans’ health.

More than half of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America members know a post-Sept. 11 service member who has committed suicide, a figure that has climbed dramatically in recent years and underscores continued problems with young veterans and mental health care.

The findings are part of the group’s annual membership survey, which drew responses from roughly 4,300 individuals on a host of post-military challenges, political priorities and social issues.

WASHINGTON — The Department of Veterans Affairs sent a bill proposal to Congress that would overhaul how veterans receive health care in the private sector and do away with the widely criticized “30-day/40-mile” rule, the agency announced Monday.

The long-awaited proposal, titled the Veterans Coordinated Access & Rewarding Experiences Act, or CARE, promises to give veterans and their VA physicians flexibility in choosing whether they receive care at a VA facility or from a private-sector provider.