thedrifter
08-22-06, 01:41 PM
August 28, 2006
Corps reworks policy on long hospital stays
By John Hoellwarth
Staff writer
Marines who are on temporary assigned duty orders to a hospital while they are recovering from injury or illness will now be administratively transferred to the Marine command nearest them after the 30-day mark, according to an Aug. 11 Corps-wide message.
The policy announced in MarAdmin 377/06 reverses the one published in April, which required funded TAD orders that gave hospitalized Marines the money to live in town for the length of their recovery.
The April policy directing TAD orders came out amid confusion over which commands should have administrative control over leathernecks who required extended hospitalization away from their units. At issue was whether the Corps could best take care of its Marines by retaining them at their parent unit and giving them TAD orders to the hospital, or by transferring their service record book and administrative control of the Marines to the command nearest the hospital — usually a local Reserve unit.
Before last April, there was no standardized method for sending Marines to the hospital for prolonged treatment. In general, Marines receiving extended hospital care were on TAD and still assigned to their parent command until the 30-day mark, when they were transferred by service record to the nearest Marine command.
“What was determined is that occasionally Marines were sent to hospitals either without TAD orders or with unfunded TAD orders. That created a lot of administrative problems for the hospitalized Marines,” said Maj. Craig Price, entitlements officer for manpower integration and administration.
The Corps initially addressed the problem in April by publishing a policy that eliminated the service record transfer for single Marines and prescribed funded TAD for the duration of their hospitalization. This was good for single Marines because it gave them more control over their living arrangements by providing money for lodging; they were no longer relegated to hospital grounds during recuperations that take years in some cases, Price said after the April policy was announced.
But the April policy kept the service record transfer for married leathernecks, sending administrative responsibility over them to the nearest Marine unit at the 30-day mark. Wherever a Marine’s service record book goes, his family can go, so injured Marines could relocate their families closer to the hospital at the government’s expense.
But Price now says the April MarAdmin involving TAD orders for single Marines “created a number of unintended consequences as far as administrative control. By transferring them back to their commands, we saw there was a long lag time in communication between Marines and their commands.”
He said his office began receiving calls from the fleet concerning confusion and inconvenience caused by the April change.
“Some units near the hospital didn’t like the idea of TAD because their facilities were good and they thought Marines shouldn’t live out in town because it caused leadership challenges” for units responsible for getting the Marines to medical appointments, Price said.
The Corps’ most recent policy revision is not just a reversal of the April message that placed single Marines on extended TAD, but also a re-invigoration of that policy’s intent, which is to take care of hospitalized Marines, Price said.
Instead of swinging the pendulum back to the transfer by service record, the new MarAdmin places the Corps’ current policy somewhere in the middle by making TAD an option. The policy is meant to ensure “that commands with cognizance over treatment facilities are aware that under certain conditions, requests for continuance in a TAD status may receive favorable consideration.”
“We’ve tried to provide commands and Marines with flexibility to handle things on a case-by-case basis,” Price said. “For the vast majority of Marines, [service record transfer] works best, for them. For some, TAD works best and we now have a policy that captures both.”
Ellie
Corps reworks policy on long hospital stays
By John Hoellwarth
Staff writer
Marines who are on temporary assigned duty orders to a hospital while they are recovering from injury or illness will now be administratively transferred to the Marine command nearest them after the 30-day mark, according to an Aug. 11 Corps-wide message.
The policy announced in MarAdmin 377/06 reverses the one published in April, which required funded TAD orders that gave hospitalized Marines the money to live in town for the length of their recovery.
The April policy directing TAD orders came out amid confusion over which commands should have administrative control over leathernecks who required extended hospitalization away from their units. At issue was whether the Corps could best take care of its Marines by retaining them at their parent unit and giving them TAD orders to the hospital, or by transferring their service record book and administrative control of the Marines to the command nearest the hospital — usually a local Reserve unit.
Before last April, there was no standardized method for sending Marines to the hospital for prolonged treatment. In general, Marines receiving extended hospital care were on TAD and still assigned to their parent command until the 30-day mark, when they were transferred by service record to the nearest Marine command.
“What was determined is that occasionally Marines were sent to hospitals either without TAD orders or with unfunded TAD orders. That created a lot of administrative problems for the hospitalized Marines,” said Maj. Craig Price, entitlements officer for manpower integration and administration.
The Corps initially addressed the problem in April by publishing a policy that eliminated the service record transfer for single Marines and prescribed funded TAD for the duration of their hospitalization. This was good for single Marines because it gave them more control over their living arrangements by providing money for lodging; they were no longer relegated to hospital grounds during recuperations that take years in some cases, Price said after the April policy was announced.
But the April policy kept the service record transfer for married leathernecks, sending administrative responsibility over them to the nearest Marine unit at the 30-day mark. Wherever a Marine’s service record book goes, his family can go, so injured Marines could relocate their families closer to the hospital at the government’s expense.
But Price now says the April MarAdmin involving TAD orders for single Marines “created a number of unintended consequences as far as administrative control. By transferring them back to their commands, we saw there was a long lag time in communication between Marines and their commands.”
He said his office began receiving calls from the fleet concerning confusion and inconvenience caused by the April change.
“Some units near the hospital didn’t like the idea of TAD because their facilities were good and they thought Marines shouldn’t live out in town because it caused leadership challenges” for units responsible for getting the Marines to medical appointments, Price said.
The Corps’ most recent policy revision is not just a reversal of the April message that placed single Marines on extended TAD, but also a re-invigoration of that policy’s intent, which is to take care of hospitalized Marines, Price said.
Instead of swinging the pendulum back to the transfer by service record, the new MarAdmin places the Corps’ current policy somewhere in the middle by making TAD an option. The policy is meant to ensure “that commands with cognizance over treatment facilities are aware that under certain conditions, requests for continuance in a TAD status may receive favorable consideration.”
“We’ve tried to provide commands and Marines with flexibility to handle things on a case-by-case basis,” Price said. “For the vast majority of Marines, [service record transfer] works best, for them. For some, TAD works best and we now have a policy that captures both.”
Ellie