 Okay. Aloha. Welcome to another edition of Military in Hawaii, and I'm your host, Calvin Griffin. And for those of you who may or not have seen the program before or are not that familiar with it, here in the program we're going to be dealing with a lot of different issues that concern the military and the veterans community. And not that it's going to be just strictly about that. Every once in a while we'll be talking about other issues that, you know, affect all of us here in the community. But right now, we are concentrating on the military and veterans community. In the future, what we're going to be doing is bringing information to the public about some of the things you may not know that's affecting the military and veterans community. As I try to remind people, like one percent of the total population here in the United States is serving our country, you know. So there are a lot of people that's not in for the glory or the money. It's about taking care of and serving our country, you know. And I do believe that, as a citizen out there, that we have an obligation to make sure that any rights or privileges that they've earned, you know, are maintained and are being lost anyhow. Excuse me. There's a lot of different issues that we deal with, like civil to VA, also systemic problems within the government. And we will be talking with people who make the policies and we invite you to talk about those issues. And we will be talking with people who make the policies and we invite your input. If there you've been through the system and there's something that you want to impart that's going to help another fellow veteran or someone in the military or the community in general, please give us a call here and we'll be more than happy to get you on the air to have you share that information. But right now, you're on the program today. I want to welcome Mr. Lee Lavell and also Kim Pennington Lavell, who's with the Optima Wound Care and also Dennis Seeking who joined us also. Thank you. Dennis has been on the program before and also Kim, you've been here before also. Thank you for having us back. For those who didn't see our previous program, could you recap what we, you know, what your company is about? Certainly. We are a wound consulting firm. We specialize in working with different centers, different hospitals, different home health agencies and hopefully the VA, working with their teams to try to optimize the wound program, the management of that. We want to decrease the time it takes to heal the wounds and decrease the cost that it takes to heal wounds. Yeah, that's one thing I know that I get all choked up when I talk about this. We talked last time. I know that you mentioned we're trying to get in touch with the VA or the system to introduce what you have. I know that it seemed like there's been a little bit of a hang up as far as making that happen. I know that in the past, my personal experience with people I've talked to who would try to introduce certain things into the system that would be beneficial to veterans and possibly overall save on costs, not only to the system, but to the individuals. But for some reason, there seems to be a lag or some disconnect where the information is not gotten to the proven authorities. Yes. And again, as I mentioned, we're not questioning the ability of the doctors at the VA. But the thing is, there are certain things that they may not be aware of that could be beneficial. And again, with you dealing with the system and all the minutiae that goes along with it, the thing is, the bottom line, it affects our troops. It affects the overall competency of the organization. It does. We have done some contacting and tried to get in to just talk a little bit more to offer our services. You are spot on. We absolutely are an extension of the physician. The physician has that expertise. We have been dealing in wounds for over 24 years now. And so have a lot of expertise that we can couple with the physician. The other thing we do is we bring all the team members together. So we bring dietary and therapy and nursing and the physician and the most important, the patient, together and work as a team to try to optimize the solution of getting that wound closed. That's the most important. And by doing that and having accountability, then we can actually decrease the cost that it takes and decrease the time it takes to heal the wound. One of the things that is a fact when you're dealing with the VA is that sometimes it takes time to get the benefits to kick in. So in the meantime, that's coming out of the veterans and the family's pockets. So if there is something in the lag in the system before these people are getting their benefits and they have to put the bill for this, it should be something that of course this system of service like what you're providing could help to alleviate some of the financial burdens that we're dealing with right now. And do you deal with a lot of veterans who are in that situation? We deal with a lot of centers who have veterans that have been in that situation. They are now where they are getting care. But there are so many veterans out there, just as you said, who haven't gotten the care that they need. And the simple solutions that we can offer will decrease the veterans cost. I mean, some different dressings or different amount of dressing changes that they do sometimes are not as necessary. And so we can decrease the time that it takes to actually deal with the wound, to cleanse it, to dress it, but also decrease the amount of dressings that they would have to purchase out of pocket. So it is, yeah, definitely. I know you mentioned that the optimum wound has been in existence for 24 years. Well, I have been a wound specialist for a board certified wound specialist for over 10 and I've been working in wounds for 24. The company is new, it's a fairly new company as of this year. So the company itself, but my experience is over, is 24 years. What about other parts of the country? Lee, how are you guys making out in other parts of the country? Are they more receptive to this type of service that you're offering or having the same problems that we seem to be having here in Hawaii? Well, I thank you for having me on as well. And first off, I wanted to, of course, for bringing my wife and I on, brought you a little something. It's one of our hydro flasks and it has our logo on it. So optimal wound solutions and we just want you to have that. And again, thank you for having us here. Yeah, I'm sorry. Part of our strategy is to grow what we're doing here locally. And from that, expand to wherever that may take us. If it's VA related, we've got a son that's in the Marines. So we have a heart and we want to try to help that way. But we've been very blessed with what's happening here and the growth that we are getting. And if it takes us beyond Hawaii shores, that's awesome. Because one thing again, we're concentrating on the military and veteran's community, but this is like a bleed over into the civilian community. Because a lot of things that are developed within the military, like for example, the space program and everything else. A lot of those technologies that were developed, let's say, did benefit a lot of the civilian side anyhow. So the taxpayers' dollars were, they got some of the money worth anyhow. The same thing here, okay, where with the large veterans community or military presence over here, we do have a lot of influence, like I say, within the community. So again, this benefits those on the civilian side who may not be aware of what's going on. Very, very much so. We worked with obviously several civilians and civilian doctors. A lot of the doctors are extremely happy with what they've been seeing and the communication back and forth, which benefits that civilian and benefits. There are a lot of veterans that are in places that are not a government organization, right? And so we're able to work with the physicians and couple together with them. So that person doesn't have to go to a physician's visit all the time. So that really decreases the strain on the patient or the resident or the veteran going out, and it improves the healing a whole lot quicker. So we have seen, actually now in the facilities that we've been in, we're seeing a greater than 50% improvement in healing rates in the wounds. With our attention in there and our knowledge coming in and the accountability that's happening. Yeah, yeah. Well, Dennis is jumping for just a second. Yes. Because Dennis, I know when you go to Washington, we talked to a lot of people there. I know with the new administration, there are quite a few people who are hopeful that there'll be some changes within the VA system. Have you talked to anybody back in Washington? Like I say, he was so inclined to further promote the systemic changes that we need to make sure that our veterans are taken care of. Well, I thank you for having me back on again, Kelvin. I did talk specifically to both of our US Senators. And my issue with them was to reinstate presumed exposure to Agent Orange for Vietnam era blue water sailors. You won't hear the word reinstate very often because that implies that we were presumed before we weren't, which is actually the case. And so everybody out there in the audience needs to know it's their turn now, since you are now aware that both Senators have been, I have provided testimony to both Senators staff that it's their turn now to go to the website for Senator Schatz and Senator Hirono and ask them to follow up and make it happen. Yeah, I think that putting pressure, I wouldn't say, I don't like to say putting pressure, but I guess that's the term I can use right now, putting pressure on these representatives, because a lot of them seem to sometimes forget what they're there for. And again, it's not to be political or anything else, but the main thing that we have to look out for is the bottom line. When I hear too many representatives, they look for plausible deniability. We're trying to do this, we're trying to do that. Of all the years that I've been involved with the veterans community, you and Dennis, you were well aware of when we do go to these different meetings with representatives from the different systemic governmental agencies that are supposed to be providing treatment or services to the vets. It's like, well, we have something in the pipeline, it's coming, it's coming. And by the time it comes about, you've lost so many veterans or was affected families and people are frustrated and they're tired. And the thing is that I know with Dennis and what you're trying to do here is to again alleviate a lot of the anxiety that they're going through. Because again, it's not only the physical part of it, it's also about the mental. And we're doing it as far as the issues with suicides within the veterans and the military community, the number of people who are being summarily dismissed from the military because of certain things called, one for example is immature personality development. We have somebody that's been in the combat, three, four terms, and then they come back and they say, okay, well look, you did a great job. But we find that that you're a little bit too immature for the military. And these people, I mean, this is just one of several different syndromes. And again, this leads over into the civilian community because what happens is that if these people are bounced out, maybe wrong term, but when they're dismissed anyhow, they don't get the full benefits a lot of times that they're entitled to. And again, this is a drain on the civilian taxpayers because we, through different social services, this is what we have to pick up on. And again, I don't want to belabor this too much, but I think there's something that we definitely need to address. And like I said, that's what we'll be doing here on the program in more and more detailed ways. And again, it's not to be throwing stones at anybody, but again, it's to make people more accountable. I'm quite sure there's other media sources out there that may be trying to tackle the issue. But I think in every way that even, like I say, if you're not in the military, you need to go ahead and be up to date on what's going on. Because these are the people who are serving our country. And one thing I do want to touch on, and you may not have any knowledge of this in Dennis, you talked about the Blue Water Soldiers Vietnam. One of the issues that we will be talking about in the future, we're trying to get reputable, knowledgeable individuals who can address this issue, is burst defects within the military community. A lot of people are not aware, like I say, just how extensive it is. And we're not only talking about in Vietnam, let's say maybe second and third generations. And there may be people out there who've been affected, they're either a parent, one of their parents, may have been in the military. And something happened for whatever reason, and it was passed down genetically. And these people may be entitled, like I say, to certain benefits. It's not that you're looking to go ahead and give more money, a government money away, it's the fact that these people are deserving of it because of the other circumstances anyhow. So I'm pretty sure at this point right now you may not be aware of it, but we will be tackling that issue. Dennis, do you have anything on that? Well, it's kind of interesting what you're just saying about the toxic materials, toxic chemicals. There is a movement that excludes Agent Orange from all the other toxic chemicals and it could be because of the nature that the personnel and their families were exposed in Agent Orange actually, it was an act of war that we dumped tons of Agent Orange in Vietnam and contaminated the waters there by Nassal Edge. But then in this other situation, it was at a military facility where the wire was contaminated. Dennis, we're going to take a short break and we'll come back, we'll continue the conversation along these lines, okay? Thanks. You want to talk about some socially sensitive issues relevant to women? Listen to these guys. Well, I think it's important in Judaism that we don't take the Bible literally, we take it seriously. Okay. I agree and really the key to understanding Christianity is compassion. If you're compassionate towards other people, you are living a Christian life and that relates also to dealing with women and men and women issues as well. Are women and men equal? They're equal. Who's better? Why should that be a difference? It depends on what. Tune in. Are you looking to get shrunk? Join us on Shrink Wrap Hawaii. My name is Steven Phillip Katz. I'm a licensed marriage and family therapist. I see couples, individuals, families, because you know why? Because we all have problems. And if you're curious about shrinks and what they talk about, come look at my show, Shrink Wrap Hawaii. And maybe you'll find your shrink. Okay, you're back with Military in Hawaii. And again, I'm a young Calvin and we have Lee and Kim Lavelle who's with the Ophthalmomal Wound Care and also Dennis E. Gay. One thing I touched about before, like I said, with the birth defects, with people aren't aware of what's going on. Again, this is one of those, I wouldn't say, I'll just come out and say it, one of those dirty little secrets that they don't talk about. And a lot of people who have experiences with their children or whatever it is, the cancers, the premature deaths, things of this nature. And again, not only with the current situation with the troops serving, but again, it goes back a long way. And to try to get into politically what happened or whatever or trying to, it just doesn't make any sense. The bottom line is this needs to be addressed. And again, this is something that I feel very strongly about because there are a lot of people that I've talked to who, they go through this and they feel like they're alone. Because nobody seems to want to address the issue because they're afraid of embarrassing the government or the military. That is not the case. The thing is is about responsibility as a country to our veterans and their spouses. Not only do we have our veterans are out there on the lines, the families who are staying back here, the things that they have to go through again. And one thing I mentioned on the previous program that people aren't aware of, and we're talking about the effect that as far as certain physical ailments causes depression, a couple of years back, we lost more dependent here in the state of Hawaii. 13 in one week. They never talked about that. This is what the direct spin off, like I said, what was happening. But again, these are the issues that when you got people out there who are really hopeful that there's gonna be somebody that will address this issue for them, that gives them hope. But if you feel that you've been abandoned, your family has been deserted in a way, then what kind of message does that sound? I mean, does that send? Because you have people out there who may want to join the military, but if you have a brother, sister, or somebody come back and say, well, we've been through all this, and this is what's gonna happen, then it's like, okay, well, that's fine. I think I'll do something else. So it affects all of us. Not only like say, the status of our military, because now we're more dependent on other ways of filling those gaps, it puts more of a strain. So this is something we legitimately need to ask and answer these questions, and anybody out there who's having a problem or had problems in with this situation, please give us a call here or contact us and we'll get you on the air. And again, it's not to be throwing stones, but we need to address this in an open and honest way that I don't think has been done in the past. It's just like when it comes up, it's in a media for a hot second and then it's gone. So we all have an obligation as veterans and people who care to make sure that these issues are addressed because it does affect all of us, you know what I'm saying? Yes. Yeah, so I'm getting back to the wound care. Okay, what are some of the, if someone wants to, diabetes, for example, okay. What do you have, like say, in your arsenal that helps that out? Well, there are so many different aspects to diabetes. First of all, to figure out the glucose levels, right? So all the different aspects. And so there are several times when you have patients or residents or veterans where they come in and they may get glucose monitoring, but they don't have special labs that we know exactly how the wound is gonna heal. Or we don't know exactly where the sensation is in their lower extremities. So we do testings with all those. We do testings to see exactly what pulse volume ratios are in readings, where the blood flow is, ankle brachial indexes, and we can do them all right at bedside. So that patient doesn't have to go back out to the physician. Now one thing that you touched on a little while ago was depression. That is a very big issue within wounds. You have a lot of patients who have family members that come to see them or children or anything, and they have an open wound in their body. They're ashamed, they're depressed. That psycho social issue really comes into play. And that's something that we try to bring everybody involved with. The quicker we can close that wound and heal it, the less likely that patient is gonna have for infection and the less likely they're gonna be depressed. So all those different issues play in. All the different diagnoses, the diabetes diagnoses, the kidney failure diagnoses, PVD, PAD, decreased arterial blood flow to the lower extremities, all of those different things we can help monitor and we can help give the physician information so the physician will know the best treatment plan to make. I know that you mentioned as far as like, do you run into oppositions from some physicians who they take over to the fact that you're bringing something to their attention that they should have been addressing to the patient? Yes. Do you get a lot of it? We don't get a lot of it, but we do get some of it. And you know, the whole thing is just working with the physician and giving them information from other physicians who can they educate each other. And then once we speak to them and we give them more information and show them where they can find physician to physician information, usually they're open to it. We do have some physicians who are still a little bit more old school and they wanna use those techniques, which is their prerogative. Okay. I know that in some cases where there's certain, they say out of the box or off the wall, the medical treatments, you know, homeopathic things of that nature where you have the FDA or you have some other kind of government agency coming in and saying, okay, well, sounds good, but we're not gonna allow it, you know. Is that with your group, the optimal wound care? All right. Has there been cases where you may have, they have representatives who go to Washington and we try to address, I mean, you gotta get to the root of the problem, you know, or the systemic thing anyhow. Has there been anything going on and on the national level, like say we tried to bring it so it trickled down? Yes, yes. Well, and it's not with our company per se, but it's with organizations that we're involved with. So I am a physical therapist by trade. The American Physical Therapy Association has done many studies and has lobbied, gone to different senators and the correct entities that they need to go to, to look at different modality treatments, such as diathermies and laser therapies and different things like that. So that, as you were talking about, it takes time to get things done. That takes a lot of time to get things done. So, you know, unfortunately, there are some aspects out there that we have definitely seen healing, but they're not FDA approved. So we can't use them. All right. Dennis, what do you think legislatively or whatever, you know, on the government side, what do you need suggestions on what we could do to help to bring, what I can say, pressure or awareness to individuals who are really responsible to make sure that we're all taking care. Any suggestions? Well, each of us sitting here at the table, we all have three representatives that are representing our interests in Congress. And if you're concerned about something, you go to their website. Actually, if it's a serious matter, then probably the best way to reach out to those representing our interests at the national and the state level is through FACTS. Yeah. Because that's one of the things that... FACTS eliminates all electronics. It's strictly a telephone type thing and it shows up in your in-basket. And they will respond to that because they're serving at your will and pleasure. Yeah, a lot of them seem to forget that they are public servants, you know, and not, you know. I guess part of the issue is there is an element in government that exists and most other large industries. I guess I'm labeling government as an industry, and of course we're paying the tab. This is there is an element that loves a backlog. So if you can backlog, say the VA, processing of claims, there is an element in the VA that loves that. And that's as far as I'm gonna go with that, but as long as your listeners and your viewers are aware that this exists, then the counterpoint to that is the person that is elected to represent your interests in Congress that funds. Again, that's one of those dirty little secrets where there's sometimes it's who you know within the system that gets you to a position that's gonna be better for you. That's called corruption. Yeah, but again, that's one of those open, dirty little secrets, I, you know, that's my favorite term nowadays, I don't know why. But, you know, where we know what's going on, but again, everybody's lookable, plausible to die building, you know, and again with the political things that come on board, it's nonpartisan as far as like say how it shouldn't be and how we take care again of our, the people in the society anyhow, you know. But again, that's another one, either for Murray Povic or somebody like that, but again, I'm not gonna shy away from anything here, like say what you see is what you get. As I mentioned to the public before, what I say is, it comes out of my mouth, I'm responsible for, so not anybody else anyhow. We're getting down to the wire, I think we've got about two minutes left anyhow, but the lead, do you have anything you wanna say or? You know, I just wanna add, you know, the largeness of wounds and the industry and what that costs the Americans around, close to $50 million a year. But half of that is just due to extended stays because the wounds aren't healing properly. And the majority of those reasons are because they're not using the correct dressings, the correct techniques, and that's where we wanna help. Right, okay, again, when I do have, I guess a couple of them are involved in the business. Again, I don't want it to seem like infomercial or anything else, but the thing is you do bring an important service to the community and if there's anybody else out there, we're gonna do a follow-up on this anyhow. Make sure, you know, and hopefully, like say, any way that I can possibly help out to do that. Sorry, wonderful. Dennis, I think we got 30 seconds or less. Anything else? Thank you for having me on board and it's always a pleasure to be able to share my concerns with your audience. And one of my things has always been Blue Water Sailors presumed exposure to aging orange because I was part of that scenario. I'm blessed with good health. I've donated a couple of body parts but that's because they quit working but I'm still moving. Yeah, that's a whole book within itself right there. But anyhow, we're ready to answer the wire right now but in the future we're gonna talk with this Katrina Eagle who if anybody's out there having a problem with the paperwork and stuff like that with the VA, that's fine. But again, thank you for what you're doing. Dennis, thanks for what you're doing and we're gonna do a follow-up. Again, wish you well on everything and I hope anybody interested gets in touch with you and we'll take it from there. Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Thank you.