The Elder Statement : Veterans Affairs Scandal

Showing posts with label Veterans Affairs Scandal. Show all posts

Friday, May 29, 2015

How Many Have Been Fired?

Phoenix VA Hospital Troubles Persist A Year After Phony Wait Times Scandal

By Dave Boyer, May 28, 2015, The Washington Times

A year after the scandal over phony wait times at the Phoenix Veterans Affairs hospital exposed widespread problems in the agency nationwide, employees say troubles at the Arizona facility are still rampant, including whistleblower retaliation, neglect of suicidal veterans and suspected fraud in overtime pay.

The top financial officer at the Phoenix VA has filed a lawsuit claiming that other administrators there orchestrated an unlawful search of her office and accused her of sexual misconduct after she blew the whistle about mismanagement. She said the stressful work atmosphere led her to overdose on painkillers.

Internal VA emails obtained by The Washington Times indicate that top administrators in Phoenix were aware of potential fraud involving exorbitant overtime pay for a 75-year-old suicide prevention counselor who was billing the agency for as much as 55 hours of overtime per pay period, sometimes while he was supposedly working at separate locations at the same time. The questions of suspected fraud and unsafe patient care have attracted the attention of investigators on the staff of Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, Iowa Republican.

Read the full story: www.washingtontimes.com

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Sunday, February 1, 2015

One day after "blanket denial"

elderstatement.com February 01, 2015 Denver VA Hospital , Veterans Affairs Scandal 0 Comments

VA Admits To 'Unauthorized' Waiting List At Denver Hospital

By WFMY News, Jan. 30, 2015

DENVER – Denver VA Hospital officials reversed course Thursday, admitting their employees broke the rules when they used an improper wait list in the sleep lab in 2012. This comes just one day after the VA made a blanket denial of the existence of secret waiting lists in Denver.

9Wants to Know spent months looking into a whistleblower's allegations regarding the sleep lab, which performs diagnostic testing for disorders - including potentially deadly sleep apnea.

"I think that putting my neck out for fellow veterans in this instance is the right thing to do," said whistleblower Tommy Belinski.

Belinski worked for the VA from 2011 to 2014. For part of the time, his boss was the hospital's chief administrator.

"The health administration cannot make data-driven decisions that are needed to better service veterans without the proper documentation, without the proper data," Belinski said.

Belinski tells 9Wants to Know he was given a copy of a manual list containing 508 unscheduled sleep clinic patients, and he says he was instructed to transfer the names onto the VA's official Electronic Wait List (EWL) in May 2012. Keeping a manual wait list would have been a violation of VA policy at that time, according to records 9Wants To Know obtained.

Read the full story: www.wfmynews2.com

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Thursday, November 13, 2014

No bias here!

elderstatement.com November 13, 2014 Barack Obama , Brent Bozell 0 Comments

MRC's Brent Bozell Schools CNN Host On Utter Lack Of Obama Scandal News

NB Staff, Nov. 9, 2014, Newsbusters

Media Research Center president Brent Bozell appeared on CNN’s Reliable Sources on Sunday to discuss liberal tilt in midterm election coverage (the first tilt being the lack of coverage on ABC, CBS, and NBC as Democrats looked like they were in trouble in the polls).

CNN host Brian Stelter tried to suggest Bozell and President Obama could agree that there is a bias, since Obama thinks there is a bias toward covering conflict.

Tuesday, October 21, 2014

No repercussions?

elderstatement.com October 21, 2014 Pete Kasperowics , Theblaze.com 0 Comments

After Lying Congress, VA Caught Hiding Truth From American Legion

By Pete Kasperowics, Oct. 20. 2014, Theblaze.com

A report late last week said the Department of Veterans Affairs purposefully withheld information from the country’s largest veterans’ group about how many veterans were still waiting for a decision about their eligibility for VA health care.

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, the American Legion — which has 2.4 million members — asked the VA’s national Health Eligibility Center in 2013 how many veterans were waiting on the VA for an eligibility decision. But in response, deputy chief business officer Lynne Harbin prepared slides that purposefully did not answer the question.

In an email to staff obtained by the paper, Harbin wrote, “I don’t think I want to go into the total number of pending records and will try to skirt the issue, should they try to raise it.”

When that email was read by the Journal-Constitution to Roscoe Butler, an official with the American Legion, Butler replied, “wow.”

Earlier this year, VA officials were caught lying to members of Congress, which made some worry that if the VA will lie to Congress, they will lie to just about anybody.

Read the full story: www.theblaze.com

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Monday, August 11, 2014

What "inept, corrupt" officials?

elderstatement.com August 11, 2014 Department of Veterans Affairs , Veterans Affairs Scandal 0 Comments

VA Not Rushing To Fire Inept, Corrupt Officials

House Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman

Rep. Jeff Miller, R-Fla., is asking about the VA’s plans

to fire employees, but has come up empty so far.

(AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)

By Pete Kasperowics, Aug. 11, 2014, Theblaze.com

The Department of Veterans Affairs has offered few indications in the last few weeks that it’s willing to move aggressively to fire incompetent or corrupt officials involved in the VA health care scandal, and so far is keeping Congress in the dark about its plans.

These signs are leading some to worry that few officials will be punished for the scandal that left thousands of veterans waiting months or even years for health care appointments.

In late July, the VA announced that it might discipline six officials, but it declined to name them, and indicated that only two of them may be fired.

That vague announcement prompted House Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman Jeff Miller (R-Fla.) to ask the VA’s Office of Inspector General for details about these six officials. But as of Monday, the IG had yet to respond to Miller’s July 31 letter, according to a House aide.

Miller also asked new VA Secretary Robert McDonald on July 30 for a weekly update on all disciplinary actions taken against VA officials, something that Miller asked for earlier in the summer.

“I requested that the VA begin providing the committee with weekly updates on all adverse employment actions being initiated against VA employees, officials and contractors,” Miller wrote. “I requested that the first production of such information be provided to the committee by Friday, June 6, 2014. To date, we have received no information regarding this request.”

Miller’s letter asked for weekly updates to begin on August 8, but the House aide said the VA has yet to comply.

The slow start to the firing process comes despite recent evidence that many VA officials were involved in the scandal. In late July, Rep. Martha Roby (R-Ala.) said she learned that more than half of the employees surveyed were told to manipulate veterans’ health care wait times in Central Alabama, and that one doctor manipulated 1,200 patient records to pretend tests were done that never took place.

Read the full story: www.theblaze.com

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Friday, August 1, 2014

Could have saved $ by asking Cantor

elderstatement.com August 01, 2014 Benghazi , Border Security 0 Comments

POLL: GOP Voters Say GOP Standing Tough On Immigration Most Important Issue

Source: www.frontpagemag.com

By Matthew Boyle, Jul. 31, 2014, Breitbart.com

Polling data compiled by Tea Party Patriots and provided exclusively to Breitbart News shows that a majority of Republican voters think Republicans standing strong on immigration is more important than repealing Obamacare, getting to the bottom of the Benghazi or IRS scandals—or anything else for that matter.

When asked by TPP’s pollster which issue they think is the important for Republicans in Congress to deal with, 34.6 percent of GOP voters said stopping the flow of illegal immigrants across our southern border. Stopping Obama’s “illegal overreach” with executive power came in a distant second with 24 percent of GOP voters saying that’s the most important, while 23 percent saying repealing Obamacare is the most important and just 7.2 percent say the IRS scandal is the most important issue and 2.8 percent say the Benghazi scandal is most important. A total of 8.4 percent of GOP voters said they don’t know or refused to answer.

The poll was conduced with 1,000 likely GOP voters on Thursday, July 24 via a combination of cell phones and landlines nationwide, with a margin of error of 3.2 percent.

Read the full story: www.breitbart.com

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Saturday, July 26, 2014

And Now This...

elderstatement.com July 26, 2014 And Now This... , Bernie Sanders 0 Comments

'Bernie For Surgeon General'

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Sunday, July 6, 2014

Veterans Turn to American Legion For Medical Help --And to the private sector

elderstatement.com July 06, 2014 American Legion , Veterans Affairs Scandal 0 Comments

By Carlos Llorca, Jul. 6, 2014, Abcnews.com / AP

A counselor at the local Veterans Affairs office looked at Rebecca King, a victim of domestic violence and abuse who was seeking help for depression, and told her she would not be able to see a psychologist. She looked too nice and put together for someone depressed, King was told.

Like others who've failed to receive help at troubled VA offices, the Army veteran then gave up.

"I have a son, I'm his only support system, I have to keep it together" King recalled telling the VA office in El Paso, trying to explain why she didn't look disheveled.

She is now among nearly 1,800 people who have turned to the American Legion, which has held town-hall meetings and opened temporary crisis centers in Phoenix, Fayetteville, North Carolina, and El Paso. People can gain access to health benefits, schedule doctor's appointments, enroll in the VA and even get back pay.

The centers come in the wake of the VA scandal that brought to light long wait times and false record-keeping among other things, and are being established in towns where the VA audit showed wait times were longer. Between now and October, crisis centers will come to Fort Collins, Colorado; Saint Louis, Missouri and Baltimore, Maryland. They also plan to visit Clarksburg, West Virginia; White City, Oregon and Harlingen, Texas.

Jessica Jacobsen, deputy director of the VA's regional public affairs office in Dallas, said the VA will use community partners, such as the American Legion, to help "accelerate access and get veterans off wait lists and into clinics."

"This is an example of this type of partnership and how it is successful," Jacobsen said, noting the VA is helping the Legion with the crisis centers, providing them with counselors, nurses, schedulers and benefits rates.

But the VA shouldn't view getting veterans access to benefits and doctors as out of the ordinary, says Verna Jones, director of the American Legion's Veterans Affairs and Rehabilitation Division.

"This is not extra, this is what is supposed to be happening," she said.

On the first day the Legion's crisis center team arrives in a town, they typically hold a town-hall meeting, where they take questions from veterans — sometimes, the head of the local VA is there to answer as well. In the days following, veterans come to the Legion post and talk to counselors, who assess the best way to tackle a given problem, be it benefits, retroactive payment, scheduling a doctor's appointment or enrolling a veteran in the VA's system for the first time.

During the center's three days in El Paso, 74 veterans were told they are eligible to more than $461,000 in retroactive payments for uncollected benefits, American Legion Post 58 commander Joe Ontiveros said.

King divorced her husband, who was also in the military, after years of abuse and moved back to El Paso in 2012. She got by until January, when she learned her ex-husband wanted to take their son for the summer.

"I started having nightmares, started feeling depressed," she said. A counselor at the VA dismissed her claims, saying a depressed person would not be well-dressed and with a nice hairdo.

Read the full story: www.abcnews.go.com

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Thursday, July 3, 2014

VA Offers Doctor's Appointment To Veteran 2 Years After He Died --Better late than never...

elderstatement.com July 03, 2014 Veterans Affairs Scandal , 0 Comments

Read the full story: www.huffingtonpost.com

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Tuesday, July 1, 2014

Fade to Black? TV Coverage of VA Scandal Drops 84% in June --What VA scandal?

elderstatement.com July 01, 2014 Media , Newsbusters.org 0 Comments

By Scott Whitlock, Jul. 1, 2014, Newsbusters.org

In May, Americans were horrified by the scandal enveloping the Veterans Administration and the media seemed to agree. World News anchor Diane Sawyer denounced the secret lists and substandard care as a "national outrage." But as the story grew and evolved in June, ABC, CBS and NBC seem to have already moved past the "outrage." In June, the networks allowed a scant 30 minutes, compared to 180 minutes in May. This is a drop of 84 percent.

According an analysis by the Media Research Center, ABC devoted 28 minutes in May to the VA controversy, but only five in June. CBS offered 78 minutes in May, but only 11 the following month. NBC's coverage dropped off a cliff in June, falling from 73 minutes to just ten. Journalists lost interest in the story even as big developments kept occurring. Among the examples:

Read the full story: www.newsbusters.org

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50 VA Hospital Workers Claim Retaliation For Blowing Whistle --Next big payouts will go to whistle blowers

elderstatement.com July 01, 2014 Veterans Affairs Scandal , Whistle Blower 0 Comments

By Jacqueline Klimas, Jun. 29, 2014, Washingtontimes.com

When Valerie Riviello, a nurse at a Veterans Affairs facility in New York, saw the clinic restrain a sexual assault survivor to a bed for seven consecutive hours, she released the woman.

The next day, Ms. Riviello said, she was removed from her post as senior nurse manager and given a full-time desk job that prohibited her from contact with patients. She eventually was reprimanded and is facing a 30-day unpaid suspension for releasing the woman.

Now, Ms. Riviello is one of more than 50 whistleblowers who say the Veterans Affairs Department retaliated against them for trying to do their jobs.

The complaints got backing last week from the Justice Department's office of special counsel, which issued a stern warning for the VA to shape up.

Ms. Riviello said her reprimand for the November incident has cowed other nurses at the Albany Stratton VA Medical Center in New York.

When the facility put the same female patient under restraints for 49 continuous hours in February, as a convenience to doctors who wanted to enjoy their holiday weekend, none of the nurses wanted to speak up, Ms. Riviello said.

"The nurses are afraid to complain or report anything," she said. "They have 100 things they've noticed, but they've seen what is happening to me so they're afraid to report anything."

Ms. Riviello said the workplace is hostile and she thinks she is being bullied.

A Stratton VA official said the hospital takes the accusations "very seriously" and encourages all employees to report their concerns.

"VA employees have a number of venues available to them to raise issues and concerns," said Peter Potter, director of public affairs for the facility. "The Albany Stratton VA Medical Center values all internal and external reviews as opportunities to affirm the quality of our medical care and practices and to identify opportunities for improvement."

Ms. Riviello, a 28-year veteran of the VA health care system, disagreed. She said her unblemished record has been tarnished by the reprimand.

"I feel like I've been humiliated and it's tarnished," she said. "Sitting at a desk eight hours a day doing a project that is something to keep me away from the clinical arena, it's too much."

The VA has come under scrutiny after reports surfaced that the Phoenix facility was cooking its scheduling books and that some veterans had died while awaiting care. Whistleblowers at other facilities then came forward with similar reports of secret wait lists and poor scheduling, some of which have been substantiated by an internal audit.

Several subsequent reports have said the VA failed to heed the warnings of whistleblowers, who sounded alarms about waiting lists and about substandard care.

"The recent revelations from Phoenix are the latest and most serious in the years-long pattern of disclosures from VA whistleblowers and their struggle to overcome a culture of nonresponsiveness," according to the letter from the special counsel's office. "Too frequently, the VA has failed to use information from whistle blowers to identify and address systemic concerns that impact patient care."

In Ms. Riviello's case, the patient had been in restraints for seven hours when the nurse said she was no longer a threat and could have been released after two hours.

"When the patient was complaining of pain and boils, we couldn't not take her out anymore. I called my supervisor and said we needed to take her out and give her basic care," she said. "When they found out she had been released, they wanted to put her back in restraints, but the nurses said no."

The February incident was similar — except no nurses stepped forward to help the woman, Ms. Riviello said, which left her in restraints throughout the holiday weekend.

Read the full story: www.washingtontimes.com

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Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Bad VA Care May Have Killed More Than 1,000 Veterans, Senator's Report Says--Only 1,000?

elderstatement.com June 25, 2014 Department of Veterans Affairs , Sen. Tom Coburn 0 Comments

By Curt Devine, Jun. 24, 2014, Cnn.com

(CNN) -- More than 1,000 veterans may have died in the last decade because of malpractice or lack of care from Department of Veterans Affairs medical centers, a new report issued by the office of Sen. Tom Coburn finds.

The report aggregates government investigations and media reports to trace a history of fraudulent scheduling practices, budget mismanagement, insufficient oversight and lack of accountability that have led to the current controversy plaguing the VA.

The VA has admitted that 23 patients have died because of delayed care in recent years, but the report, titled "Friendly Fire: Death, Delay, and Dismay at the VA," shows many more patient deaths have been linked to systemic issues affecting VA hospitals and clinics throughout the U.S.

Coburn, an Oklahoma Republican and physician, says that if the VA's budget had been properly handled and the right management had been in place, many of these deaths could have been avoided.

"Over the past decade, more than 1,000 veterans may have died as a result of VA malfeasance," said Coburn, a three-time cancer survivor who says the government should offer veterans access to private hospitals.

"Poor management is costing the department billions of dollars more and compromising veterans' access to medical care," he said.

Since November 2013, CNN has been reporting on how veterans wait excessive periods for VA health care, causing some to die in the process.

Read the full story: www.cnn.com

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Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Whistle-Blower: VA Deaths Were Covered Up --These are the deaths were aware of

elderstatement.com June 24, 2014 CNN , Drew Griffin 0 Comments

By Scott Bronstein, Drew Griffin and Nelli Black, Jun. 24, 2014, CNN Investigations

(CNN) -- Records of dead veterans were changed or physically altered, some even in recent weeks, to hide how many people died while waiting for care at the Phoenix VA hospital, a whistle-blower told CNN in stunning revelations that point to a new coverup in the ongoing VA scandal.

"Deceased" notes on files were removed to make statistics look better, so veterans would not be counted as having died while waiting for care, Pauline DeWenter said.

DeWenter should know. DeWenter is the actual scheduling clerk at the Phoenix VA who said for the better part of a year she was ordered by supervisors to manage and handle the so-called "secret waiting list," where veterans' names of those seeking medical care were often placed, sometimes left for months with no care at all.

For these reasons, DeWenter is among the most important and central people to the Phoenix VA scandal over a secret wait list, veterans' wait times and deaths. Despite being in the center of the storm, DeWenter has never spoken publicly about any of it -- the secret list, the altering of records, the dozens of veterans she believes have died waiting for care -- until now.

Read the full story: www.cnn.com

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Tuesday, June 10, 2014

VA Audit Finds More Secret Wait List --Dems now want vouchers--but not for K-12 education

elderstatement.com June 10, 2014 Acting Inspector General Richard Griffin , House Veterans’ Affairs Committee 0 Comments

By Jaqueline Klimas, Jun. 9, 2014, Washingtontimes.com

Tens of thousands of veterans are stuck in backlogs awaiting care at VA facilities, the department said Monday in a report that confirms employees regularly cooked the books, often under pressure from supervisors, to try to hide long wait times.

The audit found that 70 percent of Veterans Affairs facilities surveyed placed patients on alternate wait lists, meaning many of those veterans probably weren’t recorded in the official reports back to headquarters and were used to dole out bonuses to VA executives.

In a report that called the problems plaguing the nation’s largest single health care provider “systemic,” auditors also found a scheduling process that is “overly complicated” and “resulted in high potential to create confusion among scheduling clerks and front-line supervisors.”

As a result, more than 57,000 veterans were waiting 90 days or more for an initial appointment. Another 64,000 apparently never got appointments after enrolling.

“This audit is absolutely infuriating and underscores the depth of this scandal,” said Paul Rieckhoff, founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America. “Our vets demand action and answers.”

Richard Griffin, the VA’s acting inspector general, told a Monday evening hearing of the House Veterans’ Affairs Committee that his agency was investigating 69 of its medical facilities for suspected wrongdoing, more than half as many as the 42 that he said were being investigated two weeks ago.

The White House said the audit is the beginning of efforts to resolve problems within the VA and that President Obama deserves credit for releasing the details.

“The release of today’s data is an indication of the president’s commitment to trying to be transparent about this process,” said White House spokesman Josh Earnest.

He said fixing the problems won’t be easy but insisted that Mr. Obama has “never been more dedicated” to the effort.

Mr. Earnest said one change already has been made: The VA no longer has a goal of scheduling appointments within 14 days. The spokesman said that goal led to “unintended consequences” such as the secret wait lists.

Both chambers of Congress are working on bills that would let veterans who have waited too long for appointments to go instead to private doctors outside of the VA system, with the costs covered by the government.

Read the full story: www.washingtontimes.com

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Monday, June 9, 2014

VA Says More Than 57K Patients Are Waiting For First Visit --That we know of

elderstatement.com June 09, 2014 Veterans Affairs Scandal , 0 Comments

Read the full story: www.washingtonpost.com

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Thursday, June 5, 2014

VA Hospital Staff Got $1M In Bonuses While Therapy Pool For Wounded Vets Closed

elderstatement.com June 05, 2014 Memphis Veterans Administration , Veterans Affairs Scandal 1 Comments

By Douglas Ernst, Jun. 3, 2014, Washingtontimes.com

The therapeutic aquatic pool had to go due to an alleged lack of funds at the Memphis Veterans Administration (VA) Medical Center, but over $1 million in bonuses were approved for its employees.
The facility allocated $1,005,644 in bonuses for its approximately 2,000 employees in fiscal year 2010, the Daily Caller reported Monday. The therapy pool was closed months earlier.

“The Memphis VA Medical Center is committed to honoring veterans with safe, high quality, accessible care earned through their service to the country,” a statement sent to the Daily Caller by the Veterans Integrated Services Network (VISN) 9 read. “By law, funds for specific purposes cannot be used for anything other than what they’ve been appropriated for. It is a management decision to consider the cost benefit of maintaining programs and services within the organization.”

“No veteran has been denied services as a result of the closure of the therapeutic pool closure,” the statement continued. “Any patient that requires aqua therapy as a result of their plan of care will be referred to an accredited aqua therapy program in the private sector at VA expense.”

Two whistleblowers, who wish to remain anonymous because they are employed by the VA, told the Daily Caller that the statement is disingenuous. They told the news outlet that the VA regularly denies veterans’ request for aqua therapy care by claiming the therapy isn’t covered by their plans.

Read the full story: www.washingtontimes.com

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Why Veterans Affairs CAN'T Root Out Its Corruption --Union rules...

elderstatement.com June 05, 2014 Veterans Affairs Scandal , Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki 1 Comments

By Jeff Miller, Jun. 2, 2014, Time.com

Eric Shinseki may be gone, but there are still indefensible civil service rules in place that put failing bureaucrats' job security ahead of the safety of the veterans they should be serving.

A pair of scathing reports last week on the growing scandal at the Department of Veterans Affairs confirmed beyond a shadow of a doubt that wait time schemes and data manipulation are systemic throughout the VA, putting veterans across the country at risk.

The independent VA Inspector General’s report was brutal in its assessment. Department officials at the Phoenix VA Health Care System used tricks to hide months-long delays faced by veterans seeking appointments. This fraud increased hospital administrators’ chances of netting cash bonuses and salary increases while jeopardizing veterans’ health, the report implied. According to the IG, similar scams are taking place at VA hospitals throughout the country.

A second report, done by the VA itself, was even bleaker. Many VA medical centers are plagued by a systemic lack of integrity, it said. Schedulers were pressured into manipulating data in order to make appointment wait times appear shorter, and staff at nearly two-thirds of 216 VA medical facilities reviewed were instructed to cook the books.

Clearly the VA’s entire system for providing timely medical care is in dire need of reform. A number of lawmakers, including me, are in the process of introducing legislation that would do just that. But those reforms will be impossible to implement if the people responsible for this corruption remain entrenched in the VA’s bureaucracy.

Read the full story: www.time.com

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Wednesday, June 4, 2014

VA: Marine Watchdog--VA Deaths Actually 'In Thousands'

elderstatement.com June 04, 2014 Greg Corombos , Veterans Affairs Scandal 0 Comments

via WND

By Greg Corombos, Jun. 3, 2014, Wnd.com

Evidence of dozens of U.S. veterans dying as they waited months for appointments and treatment are just the tip of the iceberg – and the real number of deaths could be in the thousands – according to a U.S. Marine Corps veteran who closely follows the issue.

Jessie Jane Duff spent 20 years in the Marines, rising to the rank of gunnery sergeant. She is now on the organizing committee at Concerned Veterans for America. While the government is essentially admitting to about 40 deaths in Phoenix due to long waits and dozens more facilities are under investigation, Duff said the real number of veteran deaths due to the VA bureaucracy in recent years is exponentially higher.

“Yes, I do estimate it’s in the thousands,” she said. “Let’s go to the backlog that they had. Fifty-three veterans died a day just waiting on their benefits in 2011. The VA itself has those numbers. We’re talking about egregious mismanagement, a culture of corruption that was allowing all these executives to give the impression that they had 14 days of waiting time, not months and months of waiting time, so they could get bonuses. So I expect it will be several hundred, if not thousands.”

Duff said another reason the numbers are likely to soar is because of systemic bureaucracy that grinds the system to a crawl.

“In Albuquerque, New Mexico, veterans were waiting over four months with gangrene, heart disease, brain tumors. I didn’t even know you could wait that long with any of those predicaments. In Harlingen, Texas, in 2010, they decided that men had to come back with three screenings that came out positive before they could get in for a colonoscopy. By that time, it was a Stage Four cancer,” said Duff, who elaborated further on some of the red tape veterans are forced to navigate in Albuquerque.

“It came out that they had eight cardiologists on staff. But only three would work a day, and they would see only two patients per day. I’m not sure if that was two patients per cardiologist or two total. Regardless, the report I read determined that they were seeing in a week what most medical facilities could see in two days,” she said.

Duff said a final death count may prove difficult since many vets ultimately gave up on the VA system and sought care in the private sector. Duff said the most troubling aspect of this story is not just incompetent mismanagement but the blatant deceit perpetrated by VA officials around the nation.

Read the full story: www.wnd.com

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Monday, June 2, 2014

Unions Share Blame for VA Deaths --Inefficient work rules protect union jobs, compromise care

elderstatement.com June 02, 2014 Fox & Friends , Fox News 0 Comments

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Friday, May 30, 2014

VA Official Bragged About Scheduling System In 2013 Speech --Scheduling software "plays a role in...quality care"

elderstatement.com May 30, 2014 Open Source Electronic Health Record Alliance (OSEHRA) , Stephen Warren 0 Comments

By Jeryl Bier, May 30, 2014, Weeklystandard.com

A report released this week by the inspector general for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) found that "inappropriate scheduling practices are systemic throughout VHA." But as recently as September 2013, Stephen Warren, the executive in charge for information and technology for the VA, said that he could not "pass up an opportunity to brag about how" VistA, the scheduling software in use for more than two decades by the VA, "plays a role in providing the quality care Veterans receive at VA."

Warren made the remarks in his keynote address at the 2nd annual summit of the Open Source Electronic Health Record Alliance (OSEHRA):

I know I have already talked a lot about VistA, but I cannot in good [conscience] pass up an opportunity to brag about how it plays a role in providing the quality care Veterans receive at VA. VistA at VA supports the care for over six million veterans, with 75 million outpatient visits and 680,000 inpatient admissions at more than 1,500 sites of care, including: 152 hospitals, 965 outpatient clinics, 133 community living centers, and 293 Vet Centers.

These facilities are run by over 244,000 employees including more than 20,000 physicians and 53,000 nurses and have affiliations with more than 1,200 educational institutions where more than 100,000 health care students receive clinical training from VA each year.

Read the full story: www.weeklystandard.com

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