NICK GOSNELL
Hutch Post
HUTCHINSON, Kan. — Jeff Herndon with the Dole VA Medical Center in Wichita wants Veterans to know, if you are having suicidal thoughts, get help. They'll pay for it.
"It's not just Veterans enrolled in the VA healthcare system," Herndon said. "This is all Veterans, assuming that you weren't dishonorably discharged. What does that entail? First of all, you are eligible for up to 30 days of inpatient or crisis residential care. You can be in the hospital, if you need to, for up to 30 days. After that, you have up to 90 days of outpatient care related to acute suicide crisis. That will include everything. If you need to meet with social workers or anything like that, it's not just direct clinical care. Any prescriptions you might have associated with that will be covered, as well as emergency transportation required to receive emergent suicide care. Here's the bottom line, you're sitting at home, you're getting deep inside your own head, you feel like you're wanting to take your own life, pick up the phone. Call 911. Have that ambulance take you to the nearest emergency room. The VA is going to pick up the entire bill from that point forward."
Herndon also said there has been some improvement in the veteran suicide rate in recent years, though it is still too high.
"There's that myth out there about the 22 Veterans a day commit suicide," Herndon said. "We've made a lot of progress on bringing that number down. As of 2020, which are the most recent statistics that we have for an entire year, that number was down to 16.8. It's the lowest it's been since 2018, when it was 18.6 per day. We're making progress, but the bottom line is that one suicide a day is one too many. We've got to get that number down to zero and we continue to work hard to do that."
Herndon said six in ten veteran suicides happen to those who are not using VA healthcare.
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