Clinic offers new options for veterans

By Deborah Buckhalter

Published: May 13, 2008

On Monday, old friends Bill Gardener and Achille Coretti traveled 40 miles from their homes in Sunny Hills to attend a ceremony marking the establishment of a new veterans outpatient clinic in Marianna.

They weren’t the only ones excited about the news. The event drew a big crowd; so many people came that some had to park their vehicles on the grassy patches that border the parking lot.

The clinic is being established in an old medical office complex at 4970 Highway 90 just east of its intersection with State Road 71.

It is set to open in mid-to-late June, and veterans attending the ceremony were ready with questions about how to get signed on to receive services here.
They learned that the clinic will be able to serve between 4,000 and 5,000 people, and that one doctor, two nurses and a few support staff members have already been hired to get the clinic started. The Veterans Administration plans to eventually have four doctors and four nurses, a psychologist and a psychiatrist, a social worker, three health technicians and some patient services assistants on staff at the facility.

Tammy Moulton, administrative officer for the new clinic, said the other doctors and others will be hired as quickly as possible.

In the meantime, she said, veterans are asked to be patient as Dr. Richard Scott Hanson and the rest of the skeleton crew get the clinic under full steam.
She said that the Tallahassee branch of VA has identified about 1,400 veterans so far who could be served by the facility, but that she expects that number to escalate because all counties in the region have not been counted.

The VA’s first priority is to find and sign up the eligible vets who have not yet been assigned for services at another facility, she said. But, she added, veterans who want to transfer their care authorizations here from places farther away should have no problem. It just may take a few more weeks for them to get processed through the system, she said.

Coretti, Gardener and other veterans at the ceremony were taking that news in stride.

Still, they’re eager to see the day when their transfers go through.

For Gardener, who has to go 134 miles to Pensacola for his audio services, and 50 miles to Panama City for others, it’ll be a godsend.

Gardener served in the U.S. Navy aboard the World War II destroyer escort USS Gendreau. He was a machinist in the engine room and the constant noise took its toll on his hearing.

“I’m very interested in this new clinic,” he said. “It’ll be less traffic, less gasoline.”

He and Coretti, who also served in th Navy as a gunnery seaman, share the same type of hearing problems and may be able to ride together for appointments in Marianna, they think.

“It’ll be more convenient,” Coretti said, “When I have to go to Panama City, the medical service is on a Navy base and because of that, you have to go through an inspection before you can get on and take care of your business. Then there’s the hassle of the traffic and everything, so 40 miles up here beats 50 miles down there, by far.”

Albert Spurlock, who is 100 percent disabled, is also looking forward to the new clinic.

He has to travel 88 miles to Tallahassee from his home in Cottondale for services. An Army infantry vet from the Viet Nam era, he now serves as a trustee in the 12046 Veterans of Foreign Wars organization in Marianna. His trip would be cut to about 10 miles once his medical service is transferred here.

VFW Quartermaster Isaac Williams of Marianna, who served as a mapmaker in the Army as part of a U.N. peacekeeping force in Yugoslavia, is glad to know that the clinic could mean the virtual end of travel for his outpatient medical services. He also thinks and hopes that more veterans will seek out the services they need more often now that they won’t have to travel so far to get them.

Paul and Myrtle Surgnier were beaming as they approached the information booth set up at Monday’s ceremony.

“We’re so happy” Mrs. Surgnier said as she looked up at her tall husband. “We moved here (to the Marianna/Greenwood areas) four years ago from Fort Myers, but we’ve had to keep going to Fort Myers for medical services.”

“The trip is getting to be too much,” her 83-year-old husband added. “It’s hard on the body, and then you’ve got motel and gas expenses. We loved our doctor, but I also use a very fine doctor locally when I can because of the distance we have to travel. Now, this will be wonderful for me if I can get things transferred.”

Mr. Surgnier, who served as an Army infantryman, was wounded at Normandy during World War II, and saw action in all four major campaigns of that historic conflict. He has two Purple Hearts to his credit. One of them was awarded after he was shot while helping take a deep-water port needed as a pathway to receive Patton’s advancing artillery.

George Segrest, who serves as post commander of the 241 American Legion in Sneads, says he is happy to know that the younger vets will get to enroll for services here as they rotate out of active service, and he’s also looking to transfer his medical services here from Tallahassee. “It’ll be quicker and closer,” he said.

Segrest was shot three times in his 27-year active military career with the Army. Shot twice in Korea and once in Viet nam, Segrest experienced his most serious injury in Vietnam, when he took a round in the leg that devastated his sciatic nerve. In fact, Monday’s ceremony fell one day past the 40th anniversary of that fateful day.  “May 11, 1968,” he said. “Forty years ago I was hit in Viet Nam.  Years later, on that same date, I had a grandson born on May 11. It’s a pretty big day on my calendar for reasons bad and good,” he said with a smile.

And in his mind Monday, May 12, is going down as another significant day not only for himself but for the other men and women who served their country so valiantly.