The following story was on the local Fox News station:

A Soldier's Story

By Jeff Baillon, Fox 9 Investigators:

Every year, 70,000 veterans turn to the Minneapolis VA medical center for health care. But the family of one of those vets claims he didn't get the care he needed and died.

"I miss looking after him." Romona Schuna's grief is wrapped with anger. "They didn't take care of him. And he trusted them."

Was the man who gave so much for his country neglected by his country when his life was on the line?

"I haven't been treated too good," says Ed Shuna. He was just a boy from St. Paul when duty called. "That's probably me," Ed says, while looking at a photo album. He was assigned to heavy artillery. "I did all kinds of battles, all bad."

He stared through hell's picture window. some young men lose their lives on a battlefield. Ed Schuna lost his soul.

"He couldn't realize his dreams He gave his life for his country," says Romona Schuna, Ed's daughter.

Corporal Shuna came back from the Korean War suffering from shell shock. The carnage, the constant bombardment, shattered his gentle spirit. He was so emotionally scarred the VA gave him 100% disability, full medical care and help with living expenses for the rest of his days.

"I've been through a bad situation." He tried to lead a normal life. He married, and had two daughters who think the world of him.

Which brings us to this moment. "I know I'm very sick." We taped this interview with Mr. Schuna last year. He was dying from cancer. I ask, "Do you feel like the VA let you down?" Ed responds, "Someone is guilty of it."

Schuna's daughter's asked the Fox 9 Investigators to look into their father's case. "I know what we've experienced," Ramona says with tears in her eyes. "If its happening to him its happening to others." Romona Schuna says the VA Medical Center in Minneapolis failed to give her father the care he needed and deserved. "And one of his last wishes was that this kind of thing doesn't happen to anyone else."

On March 2, 2005, just 3 days after this interview Ed Schuna passed away. The cause of death: cancer of the colon.

After his passing, they requested their father's medical records from the VA. They could find no documentation that he'd ever had a colonoscopy. That procedure is recomended for anyone over the age of 50. It's a way to check the colon for signs of cancer. Early detection can make the difference between life or death.

The VA says there's a reason why Ed Schuna was never screened for colon cancer. They say he didn't want to go through the procedure. But Romona Schuna says they never discussed it with her and they should have. Her father had officially desginated her to make all decisions about his VA medical care.

"I don't know whether attempts were made to ask the family," says Dr. Jack Drucker, MVMC Chief of Staff.

This isn't the first time the family's called their father's care into question. Ten years ago he started to have problems with his speech. "They were calling his worsended condition dementia. They were calling it possible alzheimers."

One day he fell down and was rushed to Regions Hospital. A brain scan, showed there was a softball size aneurysm in his head. Why didn't the VA discover the problem?

Explains Dr. Drucker, "He had a number of visits here where the staff were not seeing any of those kinds of symptoms, typically aneurysms come on very quickly."

In 2003, there was an issue with Mr. Schuna's heart. the VA told the family that a bypass operation would be too risky. "Regions checked him out and said no, your father is a good candidate for heart surgery. 90 percent chance of success." Only then, Schuna says, did the VA go ahead and give her dad the surgery.

Dr. Drucker: "Our staff here, in everycase, was trying to do the right thing for the patient."

We wondered if other veteran's families are complaining about the quality of care at the Minneapolis VA? To find out, the Fox 9 Investigators filed a Freedom of Information Act request. That was last April. The VA still has not turned over all of the information we asked for.

Here's what it did give us: Between 2001 and 2005, there were 82 claims of alleged negligence involving the center in Minneapolis. These were cases in which veterans, or their families ,were seeking compensation because they believed the center had screwed up.

Among the complaints: A 65 year old veteran who blamed the VA for failing to diagnose his colon cancer. Another vet accused the staff of failing to treat a leg ulcer properly which lead to an amputation.

The VA denied compensation for those 2 claims and 53 others. But it did pay out on at least 13 cases, including one veteran's claim that they failed to diagnose his cancer. Another for giving an excessive dose of radiation to a patient who then developed an open wound. It also settled with the family of a "confused patient who was left unmonitored" and died after falling in a hospital stairwell. Another death occured when a 70 year old veteran left a hospital ward without oxygen. He too was found dead in a stairwell.

"I think what it indicates is that there are some cases where this VA has made some mistakes and acknolwdges those mistakes." Dr. Drucker says the Minneapolis VA is consistently ranked as one of the best hospitals in the region.

"He wanted to live." Romona Schuna believes her father would still be alive if the VA had done its job. But she's not suing, not asking for compensation. Her hope is that change will come by sharing his story. "He was sure they would take care of him. "He trusted that they would take care of him. You can see where that trust got him."

The Minneapolis VA maintains it took very good care of Ed Schuna. The chief of staff says the public should know that any patient, or family member, who has a concern about the quality of care at the VA, is encouraged to file a claim.

The VA really knows how to screw with your mind. I am service connected for diabetes but can't get a blood glucose to monitor my blood sugar because the strips cost to much. I asked the service rep at the DAV about this and this was his reply:

That is a medical decision that only the VA doctors can make. Unfortunately you have no recourse or right to appeal this type of a decision. You will have purchase one yourself if needed.

Pete.

I love this country.

TC