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Help for Veterans fights for veterans disability
rights all across the nation. You can reach them
at 800 -693 -4800 or on the web at legalhelpforveterans
.com. We want to welcome to Veterans Radio today,
Andrew Patrick George Everett, who I'm going
to call Everett because he also goes by APDG.
That's why Everett's easier. Everett, welcome
to Veterans Radio. It's a pleasure to meet you,
Mr. Jim. Well, I'll tell you what. An opinion
piece that you wrote caught my attention. The
opinion piece is titled, The VA's Disability
Evaluation of Failing Veterans. But before we
get into the opinion piece, we should explain
to our veteran radio listeners that you served
in the Air Force from 1999 to 2002. You told
me you had officially, you were a weather technician.
Unofficially, they dragged you into operational
planning and you did a lot of support work for
operational planning. Because as you noted, weather
affects everything. Do I have that right? Oh,
no, no, yes, sir. And yeah, no, it was just a
matter of it was borne out by the fact that I,
so I'm a reasonably decent writer. I was in high
school. I ran my high school newspaper my senior
year. So when I showed up to the weather hub
and then showed up to the operations floor, they're
like, oh, you can write. You've already gotten
a commendation for that. Do we have a job for
you? Which led me writing the Synoptic Weather
Bulletin, which then in turn helped lead to doing
contingency operations. oriented things because
Well, yeah, and you Once you got out of service
You picked up an undergraduate degree you you've
studied at Cornell You currently are working
on your master's in biomedical engineering at
the University of Vermont and also working on
some medical coursework at the University of
Washington, so you're not only right, well, you're
sort of an analytical guy as an engineer. That's
what I'd sort of expect. So with an emphasis,
I think you feel that your emphasis is in the
medical field. Is that right? I mean, now it's
certainly it's been a matter of transition. Like,
obviously, when I was younger, actually, when
I got medical out of the service, my goal was
to go into science and tech policy. And in order
to do that, My goal was to go to grad school
in engineering, but I ended up doing a more liberal
artsy oriented undergrad because honestly engineer
engineering undergrad, especially at the University
of Washington Yeah, that's that's that's a no
what that I mean engineering undergrad is hard
anyway But in the quarter school at the University
of Washington, it just becomes impossible so
I So I did I did a degree in econ mostly for
the orientation towards the, for the government
sector things like public finance, taxation,
policy, that sort of thing. And then my real,
my quote unquote real degree in undergrad was
effective, a math degree focusing on applied
math. And I skipped over the fact that you've
done consulting work with big national firms
in the DC area. We're not talking about any of
that today. That doesn't really matter to us.
But what I'm trying to get established is that
you've had real -world experience with the VA
disability system, and you've had sort of an
opportunity from a higher level policy, hey,
engineering -wise, there's a better way to do
this, biomedical approach. That kind of is...
how this opinion piece came about. So why did
you write it? Who did you write it for? Right.
So let's roll back to this summer. So the one
big, beautiful bill passed, and it led to changes
in federal student loan policy, which led to
the first op -ed that I wrote for The Hill, which
published late August. in particular how changes
in the One Big Beautiful bill led to impositions
on veterans and certainly prior enlisted veterans
like myself from being able to finance going
to med school or law school without just with
that with the way the student loan program has
been severely cut. Now, having done that and
then I've got a op -ed published in the Seattle
Times for DUI enforcement in September when the
piece that dropped in the Washington Post in
early October, the long -form expose that was
written by Craig Whitlock et al. And that's the
piece for veteran radio listeners that claimed
there's all kinds of bureaucracy and fraud in
the VA disability payment system. Indeed. So
now, reading that, I was one, annoyed, two, like
nothing they claimed was technically incorrect,
but they certainly, the focus was only on individual
malefactors, that is to say, individual bad boys
or girls, and didn't look and certainly made
claims like about why veterans file a supplementary
and supplemental conditions and things like that,
not at all evaluating the fact that the reason
why veterans do the things that they do regarding
VA claims is because this is how the system is
designed. Every veteran who has gone through
this claims process, as I have more than once,
they are well aware that it is easier to get
from zero to 90 % than it is to get from 90 to
100. And the reason for that fundamentally is
due to what's known as, in mathematical terms,
is a product formula that the VA uses in order
to try to prevent because, of course, in The
logic makes sense from a certain point of view,
but it doesn't fundamentally. And part of that
is, and the Washington Post article has been
beat up by all kinds of people, and I'm more
than glad to jump on the bandwagon of beating
it up because it cherry -picked bad actors, as
you point out. Indeed. And if you have 6 .9 million
disability beneficiaries, you can find a percentage
or two who are going to be bad actors, and that's
all they did. What they didn't do is really focus
on the system. And that was what I thought was
interesting about your op -ed articles. You sort
of said, they're using an old approach here,
and maybe you ought to rethink the approach,
not pick on the veterans. So talk to us about
that aspect. So there are several aspects that
come into it. The rating system and the percentage
combinations and the whole thing that the VA
uses was put out in 1945. It's encoded into the
CFR, that is the Code of Federal Regulations,
which in turn is based off of an old actuarial
model. Actuarial mathematics is, of course, especially
in applied mathematics that deals towards figuring
out things like life and health, the lengths
of things and what have you. So how they built
that formula is the assumption that all disability
conditions for veterans were substantively independent,
which is to say they are not physiologically
or statistically correlated with any which is
to say related to anything else. Now, this was
an approach that the actuarial industry and thus
insurance companies moved away from starting
in the 60s and then starting by about the middle
of the Reagan administration. I think fundamentally
the entire actuary and insurance industry had
moved towards a more domain aware, which is to
say. a combination of disabilities that for like
assessing percentage disabled, which is, I don't
like the term, but let's go with it. And that
right there is unique. I mean, Social Security,
you're either 100 % or you're zero. VA rates
individual organs and body parts differently.
As you say without any correlation between well,
if I have this I probably are gonna get that
Which also leads to your you know, you've talked
about secondary conditions Because if I've got
a bad hip sooner or later, I'm gonna have a bad
knee aren't I? Yep, and and so like the vast
majority of veterans but rather let's rewind
a second so a lot of veterans especially a lot
of post 9 -eleven veterans myself included have
PTSD. I mean, obviously, some it was working
multiple deployments. For me, it was working.
It was working in a 24 hour shop at a headquarters.
Like, I mean, we each have we each have our thing.
And along with constantly rotating shift work
or, you know, inconsistent hours and everything
else, and the various tremata of military service.
People develop PTSD and or depression people
develop Chronic pain elements from you know having
to bear a lot of weight sometimes, you know I
mean, I wasn't a combat arm soldier, but those
who were who carry 80 90 pounds on their back
for days if not weeks at a time There's a reason
why they're they're back their knees and everything
goes bad now these conditions tend to correlate,
like PTSD and chronic pain, the correlation is
above 50%. PTSD and apnea, the correlation is
undeniably like for older veterans, for all veterans
is about 50 % a bit over for younger veterans
in the post -9, certainly in the post -9 -11
realm, as well as a bit earlier, the correlation
is about two thirds of people with PTSD also
have sleep apnea. And the Washington Post article,
the first one as well as the second one they
did, where they were questioning, well, why does
APMEA pay more than losing a limb or something?
Well, going back to the way the old formula system
that the VA uses to compute disabilities, like
loss of a hand or a foot had a certain impairment.
loss of the entire arm or a leg had a bigger
one. But whether or not your foot or your arm
was impaired really didn't matter that much except
the ability to do certain physical tasks. PTSD,
apnea, things like chronic pain, those affect
sleep, affect cognition. They undeniably impact
a whole Bunch more things including work, right?
You know when you're in pain or you can't sleep
You're not as effective in life the next day
and that's part of what this takes into account
But it's still using an old model, isn't it?
Yep And it's one that as I have said the actuarial
industry and everything else went away from now
with Congress and with the VA The system, fundamentally,
it means well, but it wasn't well designed, even
at its time, but because, like with many things
in government, the inertia carried over. I mean,
it was President Reagan who once said that the
closest thing to eternity, to immortality, is
a federal government program. In this respect,
he's right. Because so much of federal law is
now built on this table, built on these assumptions,
built on everything else, even if the US wanted
to try to move to a comparable system like the
British or the Australians or the Canadians run,
you can bolt things on, but you cannot do a wholesale
tear down and rebuild like they did. Realistically
one of the things you I want to read a sentence
from your op -ed which sure says and and as you
listen to this sentence I'm thinking about well,
this is a 1945 model and We thought about things
like mental health a whole lot differently Almost
a hundred years ago than we do today you wrote
as a result the system continues to undervalue
cognitive, psychological, or fatigue -based disability
relative to physical loss. Indeed. And that's
just a societal reality between these 80 to 100
year difference points, isn't it? Yes, sir. I
mean, the... The state of the art for psycho
for psychiatric condition for psychiatry and
neurology was very very minimal at the world
at the at the cut of World War two and then like
and obviously with the Vietnam era and PTSD being
formalized as a diagnosis and everything else
and with increase in neurological studies and
knowledge of the brain everything looks like
Those things have been developed and are certainly
way more, way more is known, way more is advanced,
but still they are discovering new things all
the time. The brain, both as a physical organ
and as the seed of consciousness. What we are
learning in medical research, which I do as my
day job now, is undeniably growing all the time.
And policy should hopefully be at least relatively
informed by it to move along with it. But in
this case, with limited exception, it by and
large hasn't. And one of the points you make
of this system, which has its flaws, is that
as a result, quote, regional offices measure
performance by closure volume, not accuracy.
In some offices, Grant claims twice the rate
of others. That just adds additional confusion
and to some level, I guess, wouldn't you say
ever sort of gaming the system? Well, certainly.
I mean, so in my case, I have PTSD, I have apnea,
I have a metabolic condition all assessed as
being service connected. So for which I get my
88%. So, you know, it rounds to 90. Now, which
is funny because when discussing with friends
who are veterans who live in other jurisdictions
and where I have similar levels of impairment
to them for similar things, and yet they got
their 100 percent rating, I didn't. Now, I'm
not belabored, I'm not saying woe is me, but
then got me curious as to If my rating is different
than theirs, then what studies exist as far as.
The relatively differential rates of. Of closure
and or a rating being granted and apparently
in this case, actually a bit unsurprisingly.
VA did the bulk of that analysis themselves.
They are well aware that whether or not you have
representation, whether or not what region you're
in makes a difference as far as whether or not
your claim is accepted or not. And in my case,
I am somebody who over the last 21 and a half
years as a civilian veteran, I have lived in
the Seattle area. I have lived in the DC area,
both in Maryland and Virginia, but it doesn't
matter because fundamentally that's all covered.
I've lived in Philadelphia. I've lived in upstate
New York. I've lived in Vermont. I've lived in
multiple jurisdictions. And as a result, I've
had assessments at various times done through
various VA offices that One, if I had a bit more
stability, maybe I could have, but I don't want
to. As you say, it shouldn't be about where you
live. It shouldn't be about what regional office
or what raider is, but if the system is so archaic
that you can have such variability, makes you
wonder about the system. I want to have you comment
about another line that you wrote that I found
interesting, which was, Quote, the VA must replace
its independence -based math with a synergy -aware
domain -weighted model that advances the models
inferred by the militaries of America's allies,
including the UK, Canada, and Australia. So this
doesn't have to be brand -new fresh ground that
Congress plows. They have places they can look,
where where maybe we would get better results
for not only the government, but also for all
the veterans in terms of certainty, right? Is
that what you're telling me? Functionally, yes.
Now, as I was saying a bit earlier, ideally,
it would be great if you could tear down and
rebuild the entire system. That isn't a feasible
option. Well, certainly not politically, but
also functionally, because considering all the
veterans who live with the system as it currently
is, if the system was changed, that would require
substantive reevaluations of everybody, and I
don't think that could feasibly be done, certainly
not in a short matter of time. So even though
that would be the ideal, there are two... ideas
in practice, which could be relatively easy implemented.
One of which is either a change in the product
formula that the VA uses that allows for a correlative
factor between the various conditions, which
mathematically would be easy, but then would
require, if implemented, would in no way decrease
any veteran's rating and would either be the
same or increase in all cases because of the
multiplicative factor and the various math ethics
that I will avoid because I am sure most veterans
do not want to hear a lecture on applied mathematics
from me. Let's just say if you have a Well, let's
just go with that 70 % rating for PTSD and 50
% rating for apnea of which I am sure a non -trivial
percentage of your listeners have now That works
out to 85 % because of you know, the 70 % so
you have the 30 % remaining and yeah so now if
you had built in a correlative factor that would
work out to even with those two instead of 85
Oh, what's that work out to? about 93 .2 % ish.
And so that is to say, you get a net gain of
7 .2 % or 8 .2 % because of building in the correlative
factor, which should exist anyway. Now, as a
practice, that would mean that you have a whole
lot more veterans being pushed with a higher
combined percentage. Arguably, it should happen
that way anyway, but that also would require
rerunning the calculations for all seven plus
million veterans. Not hard to do, but as a practical
matter, the easiest thing to do would be to bolt
on a functional tier system that says anything
between zero and 20 % Okay, like it minimal and
then 20 and then over 20 to 40 being tier two
over over 40 to 60 being tier three over Sorry
over over 60 to 80 being tier four and then over
80 to 100 being tier five which if you were to
implement would also mean you wouldn't have veterans
filing all the claims. Additional claims trying
to get that last 10 or 20 percent because functionally
anybody over 80 percent from a realistic point
of view is functionally impaired to the point
that civilian employment without Severe without
a great deal of accommodation or flexibility
and justice not feasible and the so Specifying
between 83 and 88 and 92 and 97 percent is more
of a bureaucratic exercise Not an actual one
regarding veterans health and their ability to
function That's a good point. Well, I really
appreciate the time you've given us today, Everett.
I thought the opinion piece did just that, made
people think about it. I wanted to give a broader
platform to it so that people can maybe understand
a little bit, and if they get a chance, talk
to their congressman or congresswoman and sort
of say, you know, don't be afraid of fixing the
system. There's some flaws in it. It's an old
1945 model. We can do better. Sure, there's inertia,
but you've given us some good ideas to think
about. Again, Everett, thanks for your time today
for Veterans Radio. I appreciate it, Mr. Jinn.
Thank you very much. And I want to thank everybody
for listening to Veterans Radio today. I am Jim
Fossone. It's been a pleasure to be your host.
I'm a Veterans disability lawyer at Legal Help
for Veterans, and you can reach us at 800 -693
-4800. or legalhelpforveterans .com on the web.
You can follow Veterans Radio on Facebook and
listen to its podcasts and internet radio shows
by visiting us at veteransradio .org. That's
veteransradio .org. If you have a VA claim denied
by the Board of Veterans Appeals, contact Legal
Help for Veterans at 1 -800 -693 -4800. They're
experts in handling cases before the U .S. Court
of Appeals for Veterans Claims. Their number
again, 1 -800 -693 -4800. post 423 in Ann Arbor,
and the American Legion press corn post 46 also
in Ann Arbor.