Helping heal hundreds of service members at Fisher House

October 2, 2007
Helping heal hundreds of service members at Fisher House

After helping heal hundreds of service members at Fisher House comfort homes across the nation, Ken Fisher said the failures in the health care system for wounded troops and veterans that have been revealed in the wake of the controversy at Walter Reed Army Medical Center have both surprised and angered him.

And he's still mad: As the Pentagon and Department of Veterans Affairs search for solutions, Fisher said they keep stumbling over delays in staffing, technology and ingrained bureaucratic culture.

"I don't understand why anything is held up anywhere," he said. "We've lost a little momentum and we need to get that back."

Fisher, chairman of the Fisher House Foundation that builds the comfort homes near military and VA medical facilities so families of the wounded can be near them while they recuperate, recently served on the President's Commission on Care for America's Returning Wounded Warriors, which ultimately recommended more than 40 changes, all but six of which require no congressional action.