Wilson Wants to Improve Treatment for Blind Veterans
Lawmaker introduces bill to better coordinate care for Vets with eye injuries
Washington D.C. —
Congresswoman Heather Wilson this week introduced a bill to improve the
care of American troops affected by combat eye trauma.
H.R. 3558, the "Military Eye Trauma
Treatment Act of 2007," would create a Center of Excellence within the
Department of Defense specifically devoted to the prevention,
diagnosis, mitigation, treatment, and rehabilitation of military eye
injuries.
Rep. introduced the bill with Rep.
John Boozman (R-AK). A bipartisan group of Members have already signed
on to the Boozman-Wilson bill, including: Rep. John Hall (D-NY), Rep.
Shelley Berkley (D-NV), Rep. Marion Berry (D-AR), Rep. Gus Bilirakis
(R-FL), Rep. Robert Brady (D-PA), Rep. Bob Filner (D-CA), Rep. Bart
Gordon (D-TN), Rep. Robin Hayes (R-NC), Del. Eleanor Holmes Norton
(D-DC), Rep. James McGovern (D-MA), and Rep. Jeff Miller (R-FL).
“It’s really important for the
Pentagon and the VA to coordinate care for returning soldiers with eye
injuries,” says Wilson. “These are common injuries on the battlefield,
and we can improve the care we provide our soldiers and veterans.”
Members of the Blinded Veterans of
America approached Wilson and Rep. Boozman, an optometrist, recently
and asked them to introduce the measure in the U.S. House.
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.
The legislation would create a
Military Eye Trauma Center of Excellence within DOD to improve the
tracking, diagnosis, treatment, and follow-up for service members who
experience eye injuries. The legislation would require the Eye Trauma
Center to coordinate its efforts with the VA, universities, and other
entities; and to provide electronic information sharing with the VA.
The legislation would improve screening, diagnosis, rehabilitative
management, and vision research on visual dysfunction related to
traumatic brain injury (TBI) by requiring a joint DOD-VA cooperative
study on this issue.
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.
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 PTSD and TBI.
Between
October 2001 and June 2006, over 1,000 service members with combat eye
trauma were evacuated from overseas military operations. Many combat
eye injuries require multiple surgical procedures and treatments at
several facilities.
Additionally, there are over 1
million low-vision veterans in the U.S. and the incidences of blindness
among the total veteran population of 24 million are expected to
increase by 40% over the next two decades.
Provisions of Wilson’s 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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