Wounded Iran War vets struggle to find treatment and support

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The problems described in the article predate the current administration by decades, but that doesn't make the current predicament of wounded soldiers not shocking -- this is what predictably happens to them

The problems in Port Shuaiba began before the March 1 attack.

Soldiers had requested additional medical support in the weeks before the strike, CBS News reported. But when the drone hit, the unit had no established plan to care for the wounded.

“There was absolutely no evacuation plan,” said an Army colonel wounded in the blast. “If someone happened to have keys for a van in their pocket, then we got that van and we loaded soldiers into it.”

A few Kuwaiti ambulances arrived, but the colonel said most of the wounded were transported in an improvised rush.

It was “Googling what the closest hospital was and just driving in a panic,” he said.

Several of the most seriously injured underwent emergency surgery at a Kuwaiti hospital and were medically evacuated on March 4, according to people familiar with their treatment and to open-source flight-tracking data.

Others remained in Kuwait for more than a week despite perforated eardrums, shrapnel wounds, and symptoms of traumatic brain injury. They stayed in safe houses, eating military field rations and takeout while waiting to leave the country.

https://thewarhorse.org/iran-war-wounded-healthcare/

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A medic eventually conducted traumatic brain injury assessments, which helped do ent that the injuries occurred in combat. But it wasn’t until nine days after the attack that the soldiers boarded a flight to Ramstein Air Base in Germany.

When they arrived, the colonel said he felt relieved. He believed the wounded troops would finally receive comprehensive medical care at Landstuhl Medical Center.

Instead, “one by one they turned us away,” he said.

Multiple soldiers said Landstuhl staff told them that because they had not arrived on a formal medical evacuation flight, they were not being treated as wounded in action. They were denied inpatient beds and told to schedule outpatient appointments weeks later, in April or May.

Officials at Landstuhl did not respond to questions from The War Horse.

The War Horse spoke with multiple experts in military medicine about the soldier’s dealings with Landstuhl staff. All of them said the term “wounded in action” is typically determined by whether troops are wounded by enemy combatants, not by the type of flight they take.

“If you have rated a Purple Heart, which can only be obtained by an injury sustained from direct contact with the enemy, then that’s a MEDEVAC,” said retired Rear Adm. David Lane, a former Navy surgeon who deployed with the Marines and retired in 2018.

By the time the soldiers reached Fort Hood in mid-March, they were frustrated and still in pain.

They had gone days without being able to refill prescriptions issued at the hospital in Kuwait. One soldier with a badly injured shoulder had been relying on Motrin and Tylenol. At Fort Hood, she said, she repeatedly had to remind medical providers that she had survived a drone strike.

A couple of weeks after arriving, one of the soldiers received a call from a German phone number. Landstuhl was finally ready for the appointment he had been told to schedule before leaving Germany.

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At the end of March, the soldiers were told they could continue recovering in the Army’s Soldier Recovery Units, or SRUs, a network of 14 facilities for wounded, injured, or ill soldiers with complex medical needs. Several members of the unit chose to go home instead.


Others asked to remain together. The Army denied the request and sent them to units across the country, generally based on their home of record. The soldiers were told the policy would place them closer to family and other support.


Instead, some said, the separation left them feeling even more isolated.


“I literally lived in my room by myself,” one soldier said. “It kind of took a toll on my mental [health].”


She asked to join group therapy but was told there were no openings. She requested leave to visit family and was denied. Eventually, she left the Soldier Recovery Unit and turned to the Department of Veterans Affairs for care.

“I was just so fed up, and I didn’t want to be isolated again,” she said.

But getting care through VA also proved difficult, this soldier said. She said primary care appointments were repeatedly canceled, and because her military medical records had not been transferred into the VA system, she could not receive referrals for specialty care, such as neurology or orthopedics.

“I see why a lot of soldiers snap,” she said. “Because if you’re physically wounded and you’re fighting the VA or you’re fighting military doctors, it messes with your mental health. You give up.”

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One soldier at Walter Reed said his appointments appeared to receive priority, though some were still scheduled two or three months away. Still, he wanted to return home to the Midwest, where he could be near his wife and children and receive treatment at a local trauma center.


“Why can’t they keep me in orders, send me home where I’ll probably do a lot better mentally, and let me finish out care there?” he said.


The Army Reserve colonel recovering in another SRU said he appreciated the support of the SRU staff. But it took two months for the unit to arrange a CT scan for a persistent cough. The scan showed abnormal tissue growth in his lungs, possibly from inhaling unknown toxic fumes during the blast.


One problem, he said, is that SRU patients use the same medical facilities as everyone else on the installation. That can leave combat-wounded soldiers waiting alongside patients seeking care for appendicitis, broken bones, and other conditions.

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Some soldiers have already been discharged from the SRUs and cleared to return to duty.

One said he was told his injuries were not severe enough to require complex care, despite a traumatic brain injury, hearing loss, and post-traumatic stress disorder. He is now trying to obtain treatment through the civilian health care system.

“I’ve been struggling to get mental help,” he said. He has also not yet seen a neurologist.