Released 4/25/16 at The Crescent-News | Tags: Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims
The Veterans Administration has been forced by a U.S. Court of Appeals decision to take a giant step forward to help veterans with their health care. On Friday, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for Veterans Claims voted unanimously to strike down a VA regulation that the VA had been using since 2009 to deny reimbursement requests from veterans who had to get emergency medical care outside the VA system. The court rebuked the VA’s reimbursement regulation and said it had unlawfully refused to fix the regulation. The VA had been specifically mandated to fix this regulation by Congress in 2009. The VA, by federal statute, is required to pay these claims.