In our view: Officials should take opportunity to answer doubts regarding the clinic

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We support the push for an audit of patient files at the mental health clinic at Canadian Forces Base Gagetown.

The clinic exists to serve soldiers dealing with operational stress injuries. The interests of the soldiers must be paramount to the clinic's operation.

As soldiers' mental health should be the goal of such a clinic, an audit, good or bad, will benefit soldiers.

A positive audit will reassure soldiers concerned about the quality of their treatment. It will also highlight the work of the clinic.

A negative audit, however, will identify problems and suggest solutions.

Either way the clients, the soldiers, will win.

Psychologists Robin Geneau and Joyce Belliveau of Fredericton are calling for the audit.

They say the needs of soldiers aren't being met at the CFB Gagetown clinic. They say spouses claim clients are spending long periods of time with unqualified staff.

"Somebody needs to go in there and do an audit of their files and identify who has received treatment and who hasn't received treatment, and where the clients are at," Geneau told The Daily Gleaner.

"They will never admit that people are falling through the cracks, but we have heard these falling-through-cracks stories."

Geneau and Belliveau will talk to a House of Commons committee in Ottawa today on the subject.

We hope the committee will support their call for an audit.

There is a need to clear the air. Last year, the pair complained about the clinic to the military ombudsman, but they claim their concerns were dismissed.

The military declined to comment on our Wednesday story. Veterans Affairs Minister told us in today's story that officials are trying to reach out to those who "suffer in silence." He also supported the work of the clinics.

"We've made efforts that anyone in the veterans' community who needs that type of help, the help is there for them," he said. "The fact is that we have clinics across the country, we have professional people on the ground doing exactly what (the psychologists) criticized us for not doing."

But questions linger.

An audit is needed to put these questions to rest. Good or bad, soldiers who have fought bravely for our country deserve to know the quality of their treatment. We owe that to them.