The time Kelly Keats has left with her husband Alan is precious.
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Surgery and chemotherapy have failed to stop his brain cancer.
![Alan and Kelly Keats. Mr Keats was deployed overseas six times. He has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer. Alan and Kelly Keats. Mr Keats was deployed overseas six times. He has been diagnosed with terminal brain cancer.](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/fdcx/doc76tchc8yfuc2y92ue3p.jpg/r739_470_3590_2112_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
The veteran, who was deployed six times to Iraq and Afghanistan, has been told he's got less than two years to live.
Mrs Keats knew there was little time to lose as the Canberra couple waited this year for the results of a test helping find the best treatment.
When they learnt a delayed payment from the Veterans' Affairs Department stopped the testing for several months, Mrs Keats felt physically ill.
"I'm just thinking about the 'What ifs'," she said.
"What if that testing had been done, that was supposed to be done?"
The couple might have received the results in May, if there had been no delay, she said.
Mrs Keats wonders whether that would have led to treatment bringing better news than her husband received last month, when a scan showed he had two more tumours.
Instead, the payment delay stopped testing until July.
"I thought, 'This should have been done months ago', and that's when I started asking questions about the delay," Mrs Keats said.
The Veterans' Affairs Department in March agreed to cover $9600 needed for molecular testing on Mr Keats' tumour.
Service provider Precision Oncology sent an invoice to the department that month, and followed up with two reminders.
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It wasn't until June the department paid the money, but it sent the funds to ACT Health, where the payment sat for several weeks.
After Mrs Keats asked about the delay, Precision Oncology received the payment in July, and the testing finally began.
"There's been a break-down somewhere," Mrs Keats said.
"At the end of the day, I don't want this to happen to anyone else."
When asked about the delay, the Veterans' Affairs Department and Canberra Health Services said they could not comment on individual cases.
Mr Keats served 15 years in the military and five more as a reservist, and was exposed to signals equipment that his wife suspects contributed to his November 2017 cancer diagnosis.
She has spent much of her remaining time with him trying to navigate the Veterans' Affairs Department since it agreed to pay his medical costs without accepting liability for his condition.
Other documents have gone missing on their way to the department. Veterans' Affairs said it didn't receive Mr Keats' first application in May 2018 for it to cover his treatment.
When the department received the next application and agreed in August that year to fund his medical costs, it backdated his eligibility by four months.
The veteran was left liable to cover several months of bills himself until a departmental staff member agreed to move his eligibility date backwards to mid-November 2017.
![Kelly Keats has had to spend much time navigating the Veterans' Affairs Department in her last months with her husband Alan, who has brain cancer. Picture: Sitthixay Ditthavong. Kelly Keats has had to spend much time navigating the Veterans' Affairs Department in her last months with her husband Alan, who has brain cancer. Picture: Sitthixay Ditthavong.](/images/transform/v1/crop/frm/fdcx/doc76hfjl6u13c11hepq5pb.jpg/r0_284_5327_3279_w1200_h678_fmax.jpg)
In emails afterwards, the department said this was an error and refused to cover his early medical costs.
The department apologised to Mr Keats last month for the error, and reimbursed him for the remaining bills as compensation after receiving questions from The Canberra Times.
Mrs Keats, working and caring for two young daughters, said the medical costs had been financially trying for the family.
She has struggled to reach a single point of contact in the department to resolve problems, finding herself transferred to other staff, having to repeat herself, and speaking to delegates unable to answer her questions.
It took her several weeks and follow-up emails until the department agreed to cover a $450 private health insurance excess bill received after one of Mr Keats' surgeries.
I'm sick of chasing payments to which he is entitled. I don't know why I have to jump through these hoops. It's a terminal illness.
- Kelly Keats
"If I'm working from home and have to call DVA, the frustration levels go through the roof," Mrs Keats said.
"I'm sick of chasing payments to which he is entitled.
"I don't know why I have to jump through these hoops. It's a terminal illness."
A Veterans' Affairs spokesman said the majority of the department's clients had a "relatively seamless" experience, but that the department understood some did not.
"This is regrettable and where we are made aware of instances of a veteran and their family requiring additional support, the department seeks to do so," he said.
Mrs Keats said her experiences with Veterans' Affairs had heaped more pressure on her husband and family.
"He joined the army so he could serve," she said.
"If guys like Alan didn't want to serve, where would Defence be?"