What the… Sack of Peanuts?

I’ve been in Los Angeles for the past 30 hours and just got the kids to bed. I was checking in on my feeds and saw this article on Slate with a salacious (and kind of awesome) headline (click here to read it) and whoa. Whoa. Whoa. Whoa.

Several people have left comments (including me!) about how awful the Veteran’s Administration is (for those who don’t know what the Veteran’s Administration is, it’s commonly referred to as “VA” and can be read about here. They provide healthcare to veterans. Here’s the page for VA healthcare.

Which made the Slate article kind of interesting because several groups have found that the VA provides better healthcare than the private system in the U.S. What?

Yep:

From the New England Journal of Medicine, “Effect of the Transformation of the Veterans Affairs Health Care System on the Quality of Care”

From the RAND corporation: Improving Quality of Care How the VA Outpaces Other Systems in Delivering Patient Care (Link is a PDF)

From the American Public Health Association coees a study comparing VA healthcare to Medicare: Risk-Adjusted Mortality as an Indicator of Outcomes: Comparison of the Medicare Advantage Program With the Veterans’ Health Administration

From Washington Monthly: “The Best Care Anywhere”

Hmmmmm.