Dole focuses on improving care for veterans

? After a bad fall two years ago, former Sen. Bob Dole visited Walter Reed Army Medical Center up to three times a week for treatment on his injured left arm and shoulder.

Now, the World War II veteran and former GOP Senate majority leader from Kansas is helping lead the probe into allegations of shoddy conditions for wounded troops at Walter Reed and other military and veterans’ hospitals across the country.

“We don’t want to rush to judgment,” Dole said in a wide-ranging interview Monday.

“Everyone we’ve talked to is very complimentary about the care they receive,” Dole said. “It’s not the doctors or the nurses or the people on the wards. It’s when they change from inpatient to outpatient and are waiting for a doctor’s appointment, waiting to go home, waiting to go to the VA or back to their unit – this is where it’s tangled up.”

Dole, who turns 84 in July, brings a wealth of personal experience to his new role as co-chairman of the Commission on Care for America’s Returning Wounded Warriors.

One of the nation’s most prominent veterans, Dole endured a long and painful recovery from wounds suffered in World War II that cost him the full use of his right arm.

When he fell on his left arm last year, just a few weeks after getting a hip replacement, Dole spent 41 days in the hospital.

“I still go to Walter Reed for outpatient treatment to see the doctor if I have some problem,” Dole said. “I was there for Christmas dinner and Thanksgiving dinner, just to have dinner with the men and women who are out there.”

The commission has conducted hearings to review conditions at military and veterans’ hospitals, which have been overwhelmed by injured troops from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Panelists are looking at ways to reduce paperwork and eliminate problems in the disability ratings system.

Dole said one of the main problems is the inability of the Pentagon and the Department of Veterans Affairs to share patient records electronically.

“Everything is electronic at the VA, and the DOD is trying to catch up,” Dole said. “That’ll make a big difference.”

The commission is expected to issue a final report in late July.