I agree. The addition of bureaucratic rules has burdened the VA medical record system immensely.
They started using the medical records system to create treatment statistics and then began altering the records to improve the statistics.
The VA has also started data mining their medical records system to predict individuals most likely to commit suicide for closer monitoring.
I am all for the concept of data mining, since I believe that in the world of a single EMR, they can find relationships between all kinds of diseases and various medication states and such. I believe hospitals in the public domain are trustworthy, because the government has show a zeal to prosecute and fine, so hospitals are extremely careful with patient data, and even then, when they make an honest mistake, the government pounces and levies extraordinarily harsh penalties.
However, I am 100% distrustful with the government, since they have shown they have zero trustworthiness with personal data, and to make it worse, there is zero accountability. Look at what happened with the IRS letting loose data on millions of citizens, and not a single person was disciplined or fired. Shameful. I don’t trust the government with any of my personal info even though I am forced by law to give it to them. And that is distrust for simple guarding of the data as any private entity would be required to due to accountability and business viability concerns.
When it comes to the misuse of my information by the government, I am doubly wary.
If I were a veteran dependent on the VA for care, I would always be concerned that anything I said would immediately end up in the hands of a government entity outside of the VA, and not in a good way.