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| Wilson Wants to Improve Treatment for Blind Veterans |
August 15, 2007 |
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Lawmaker will introduce bill in September to better coordinate care
Albuquerque, N.M. –Congresswoman Heather Wilson announced today that she will introduce legislation in Congress to help servicemen and women suffering from traumatic eye injuries sustained while in the service.
Wilson today addressed members of the Blinded Veterans of America and told them that she will introduce legislation to create the Center of Excellence in Prevention, Diagnosis, Mitigation, Treatment and Rehabilitation of Military Eye Injuries. Members of the Blinded Veterans of America approached Wilson recently and asked her to introduce the measure in the U.S. House. A similar measure, S.1999, was introduced in the U.S. Senate by Senators Pete Domenici, Chuck Hagel, John Kerry and Barack Obama.
Wilson says she will introduce the bill with Congressman John Boozman, an optometrist from Arkansas who serves on the Armed Services Committee. The bill will be introduced on Tuesday, September 4, 2007, the first day the Congress reconvenes after the August district work period.
Serious combat eye trauma from Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom has climbed to the third most common injury from these wars only behind post traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injuries. The Department of Defense has no central center that tracks these injuries, but reports show that 13% of all combat surgical hospital emergency operative procedures in Iraq were for severe combat eye penetrating wounds.
In Operation Iraqi Freedom and Operation Enduring Freedom, the weapons used by our enemies have caused significant damage to the vision of many U.S. soldiers, particularly when soldiers are victims of sophisticated roadside bombs. Data compiled by the Defense Department between March 2003 and April 2005 reported that 16 % of all casualties evacuated from Iraq had associated eye injuries. Walter Red Army Medical Center has treated approximately 506 service members with either moderate to severe vision injuries. Furthermore, the National Naval Medical Center has approximately 450 eye injuries requiring surgery.
Provisions of Wilson’s planned legislation:
• The legislation would create the Center of Excellence in Prevention, Diagnosis, Mitigation, Treatment and Rehabilitation of Military Eye Injuries to be established by the Secretary of Defense.
• The Center would be required to collaborate with the Department of Veterans affairs, institutions of higher education and other appropriate public and private entities.
• The center would develop, implement and oversee a registry of information for the tracking of the diagnosis, surgical intervention or other operative procedure, other treatment, and follow up for each case of eye injury incurred fighting in OIF or OEF.
• Information gathered through this registry would help in research and for the development of best practices and clinical education incurred during combat.
• Access to the registry would assist physicians in following these service members who are at risk.
• Access to the registry would assist physicians in following these service members for various complications of retinal detachments, traumatic cataracts, corneal decompensation, post operative glaucoma if the records of these eye injured are in central eye trauma registry where ophthalmologists and optometrists are able to access these surgical records.
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