Family of injured soldier says he was denied proper care

[NNN0LHI]

http://rockymountainnews.com/drmn/state/article/0,1299,DRMN_21_2378809,00.html

COLORADO SPRINGS - The family of a Fort Carson soldier who suffered brain damage during an attack in Iraq says that he was denied proper medical care when his commanders overruled a doctor's order to send him to Germany for treatment.

Fort Carson is investigating why commanders kept Sgt. Aaron Renstrom in Iraq despite an Army doctor's report that said he was "unable to perform his duties in a combat zone safely." Jessica Renstrom is outraged commanders forced her husband to stay in a war zone against a doctor's advice and allowed his condition to go untreated for months.

"I am extremely angry," she said in the home where the couple and their two children live near Fort Carson. "They have an obligation to make sure soldiers are taken care of and they didn't." After he returned to Colorado Springs on leave late last month, Renstrom, 26, of Hector, Minn., finally got the tests he needed. He learned last week he suffered brain damage when he was thrown from a Humvee on July 12 when it was attacked with a homemade bomb.

A Fort Carson doctor recommended Renstrom, who is suffering memory loss, headaches and other problems, stay at the Colorado post for care. Renstrom fears he might still get pulled back to the war.

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[IndianaGreen]

1. The war stories are beginning to trickle out of Iraq

and I suspect we are going to see many other anecdotes like SGT Renstrom's.

[Melsky]

2. Support our troops

unless it means, um , actually supporting them.

[Kinkistyle]

3. He's still a viable "Meat Shield" for "The War"

Just a lil shell-shock. As long as he's still breathing, he's still viable on the battlefield. Suit him up and send him out to die for Halliburton and Carlyle.

[7th_Sephiroth]

4. it makes you

want to destroy groups who profit on this stuff, isint there any law against war profiteering

[ninkasi]

5. It's not right

for a commanding officer to be able to overrule a medical opinion. I am more and more disgusted with Bush and his cronies every day. They dare, DARE, to send our troops to fight in an immoral and illegal war, then disgard them like so much garbage when they have no further use for them.

There is no hell hot enough for them.

[loudnclear]

6. This is the issue, if kept in front of the public, will be Bush's undoing!

But we have to give the issue a voice. The media is surpressing this message on every turn. Bombard them with your e-mails and phone calls.I sent an e-mail to Sharpton and Kucinich to get this message out there.