Director's Message March 15, 2024

We cover many services specific for our women Veterans, such as well-woman visits, maternity care, and birth control. From sexual health care to menopause care, we are striving to ensure that women Veterans can access everything they need through VA. 

The Veterans Health Administration is governed at a federal level, which allows us to follow federal guidelines rather than state guidelines when providing women’s health care. We can offer counseling about options to women who are pregnant, and in some cases, we may even be able to cover an abortion if it is medically necessary. National VA leadership feels that women’s health is important enough for VA to take this position and support women Veterans in their journey, wherever it may take them. 

March is Women’s History Month, which makes this a good time to remind women Veterans that VA respects the historic struggles that women have faced to gain equal rights. In health care, and in all things, women deserve equality. If you are a woman Veteran who is not yet signed up for VA care, give us a call to find out more: 1-800-214-1306.

Whole Health: Write it Down

Doctors will often recommend that patients keep a log of food they eat, exercise they do, and their symptoms throughout the week. The Whole Health program has fillable forms that can help Veterans easily log their health information each day. It might seem frustrating to be asked to record every soda you drink and every carrot you eat, but keeping a log is the best way to notice trends that can be the key to help diagnose conditions or recognize risk factors. 

When you keep a log of what you eat and drink, it can help measure how much sugar or carbohydrates you consume on average per day. When you also log exercise and symptoms as well, it’s easier to see the connections between your diet and overall health. For example, you might notice that you had more symptoms on days when you ate foods that enable inflammatory processes. This could help you make dietary changes that can leave you feeling better every day. You might notice that you feel good on days you exercise, but bad for several days after. This could help your doctor recognize the need to do blood tests and possibly refer you to a rheumatologist because there are autoimmune conditions that can sometimes be exacerbated by exercise. 

Even if you never show your log to your doctor, it can help you recognize things you may want to change in your own behavior. That energy drink at 2 p.m. might be connected to insomnia that night. Pushing yourself too hard at the gym might be linked to that Lupus flare-up. When we see our behavior laid out on paper, we can be honest with ourselves about their impact. Even without sharing that information, it can still be a powerful tool to help you learn what matters most to you. 

Upcoming Events

VAPIHCS continues to hold outreach events to bring services closer to where are Veterans live. We will hold a PACT Act Community Call on March 27-28, 2024, from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Kauai Veterans Center at 3215 Kauai Veterans Memorial Highway, Lihue, HI 96766. We will have PACT Act registration, vaccines, health screenings, and much more. We hope to see you there! 

We are also excited to invite you to a registration event for the Daniel Kahikina Akaka VA Clinic at 91-1051 Franklin D. Roosevelt Avenue in Kapolei. The event is on April 5, 2024, from 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. and will include registration services, whole health, caregiver support, benefits advisors, and so much more. If you are curious to see our new clinic before it opens, this is your chance! We expect to see our first patient on April 8, 2024, with a gradual increase in services through the end of the calendar year. 

Thoughts from Chaplain Richie Charles

Junko Tabei made history, when in 1975, she became the first woman to summit Mount Everest. At 29,035 feet above sea level, the summit of Mount Everest stands as the highest point on earth. When you consider the fact that commercial planes typically fly at an altitude between 31,000 and 38,000 feet, the peak of Mount Everest is not far below a plane’s cruising altitude. 

The journey up Mount Everest can take about two and a half months. It’s a slow, arduous ascent. But if a person were to skip that journey and be magically teleported from sea level up to the top of Mount Everest, things would go bad, fast. At its peak, Mount Everest has only a third of the oxygen found at sea level. But climbers have been able to reach the summit and breathe in the otherwise fatal conditions because during their slow journey up the summit, as their bodies gradually “acclimatized”. Their very journey up the mountain, prepares them to stand on top of the mountain. 

Like these mountaineers, we all have different mountain tops we are working towards. But sometimes it can feel like the progress that we’re making towards our goals is slow. If given the option to just snap our fingers and forgo the journey and skip the toil, disappointments, and trials that inevitably accompanies any worthy pursuit, perhaps we would. But like Everest, our ascent towards our mountain tops contains lessons and experiences that are vital for enabling us to thrive once we finally arrive at our destination. If we’re honest, we can look back and see how the very experiences of our past were critical for making you who you are today.  Don’t despise your journey because you’re not where you want to be yet. It just might be “acclimatizing” and preparing you for the very destination you are working towards.

One Team, One Ohana!
Adam M. Robinson, Jr., MD, MBA, CPE 
Director, VA Pacific Islands Health Care System
VADM, MC, USN, (RET)
36th Surgeon General, USN

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