DEATH, DELAY & DISMAY AT THE VA - AN OVER-SIGHT REPORT FROM SENATOR TOM COBURN, M.D. , Pages - 124 - INTRODUCTION Dear Taxpayers, Too many men and women who bravely fought for our freedom are losing their lives, not at the hands of terrorists or enemy combatants, but from friendly fire in the form of medical malpractice and neglect by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). Split-second medical decisions in a war zone or in an emergency room can mean the difference between life and death. Yet at the VA, the urgency of the battlefield is lost in the lethargy of the bureaucracy. Veterans wait months just to see a doctor and the Department has systemically covered up delays and deaths they have caused. For decades, the Department has struggled to deliver timely care to veterans. The reason veterans care has suffered for so long is Congress has failed to hold the VA accountable. Despite years of warnings from government investigators about efforts to cook the books, it took the unnecessary deaths of veterans denied care from Atlanta to Phoenix to prompt Congress to finally take action. On June 11, 2014, the Senate recently approved a bipartisan bill to allow veterans who cannot receive a timely doctor’s appointment to go to another doctor outside of the VA. 1046 But the problems at the VA are far deeper than just scheduling. After all, just getting to see a doctor does not guarantee appropriate treatment. Veterans in Boston receive top-notch care, while those treated in Phoenix suffer from subpar treatment. Over the past decade, more than 1,000 veterans may have died as a result of VA malfeasance, 1 and the VA has paid out nearly $1 billion to veterans and their families for its medical malpractice. 2 The waiting list cover-ups and uneven care are reflective of a much larger culture within the VA, where administrators manipulate both data and employees to give an appearance that all is well. Good employees inside the VA who try to bring attention to problems or errors are punished, bullied, put on “bad boy” lists, and transferred to other locations. These whistleblowers, who come forward to expose the problems, demonstrate many employees within the VA are dedicated to serving veterans and willing to put their livelihood at risk to ensure our nation’s heroes are getting the care they were promised. Without their courage, more veterans may have died unnecessarily and Washington would have continued to ignore the systemic problems within the VA. As a Marine, Oliver Mitchell lived by the motto “No Marine left behind.” As a VA employee, Mitchell was ordered to leave behind thousands of former service members by purging their requests for medical appointments. Mitchell refused and suffered years of retaliation before he left the agency. 3 Meanwhile, employees who bend the rules or even break the law are rewarded with financial bonuses or put on paid leave from work. This has created an environment where veterans are not always the priority. For example, the Department suffers from a shortage of health care providers; yet, the VA pays nurses to perform union duties and allows doctors to leave work early rather than care for patients. It also tolerates employees skipping work for long periods of unapproved absences, while veterans cannot get phone calls answered or returned. This is not the type of service veterans should receive, and it certainly does not reflect the commitment made by our nation to the defenders of our freedoms. As is typical with any bureaucracy, the excuse for not being able to meet goals is a lack of resources. But, this is not the case at the VA, where spending has increased rapidly in recent years. After splurging on junkets, generous salaries, bonuses, and office renovations for its employees, the VA ends nearly every year with tens of billions in unspent funds. This includes at least a half-a- billion dollars specifically intended to provide health care. Billions more are lost to poor planning. Poor management is costing the Department billions of dollars more and compromising veterans’ access to medical care. Most the VA’s construction projects, for example, are over budget and behind schedule. And even when state of the art facilities are constructed—such as the new VA hospital in North Las Vegas, which has been called the “Crown Jewel of the VA Healthcare System”—the Department is unable to hire enough doctors. 4 The VA then must spend millions of dollars to send veterans to clinics in other cities and states, which is both costly and inconvenient. This, of course, is the problem when patients are trapped within a closed system. VA hospitals do serve an important and unique role. Many of the 9.1 million veterans enrolled in the VA Health Care System 5 like the doctors and appreciate the service provided by the VA. They also like having a health care system specifically designed to meet the unique and specific needs of retired members of the armed forces. But too many veterans who rely upon the VA are stuck in a bureaucratic maze that is inconvenient, unaccountable, inefficient, and limits choices with varying outcomes. Ironically, the veterans who fought for freedom are given the least amount of freedom over their own health care decisions. There is a simple solution: Make every hospital, a VA hospital and allow veterans to choose where and when they receive treatment. “We’ve seen battle. We’ve seen combat,” says Vietnam veteran J.R. Howell, asking “why do we have to ... fight when we come back home just to get proper medical care?” 6 Veterans who have survived war should no longer have to battle with bureaucracy to access the best possible health care. The foundation of having other people serve depends on how well we take care of those that have. This report, “FRIENDLY FIRE: Death, Delay and Dismay at the VA,” outlines what still ails the VA and prescribes to hold the Department accountable to ensure our commitment to every one of our veterans is upheld. | 5 Friendly Fire Sincerely, U.S. Senator coburn.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?a=Files.Serve&File_id=577d9e90-ee2a-4eee-a52d-2cf394420761
Posted on: Wed, 25 Jun 2014 04:36:05 +0000
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