This ain't Hell, but you can see it from here

Category: Veterans’ Affairs Department

  • Robert Petzel, undersecretary for health care at the VA resigns

    Robert Petzel, undersecretary for health care at the VA resigns

    So it looks like the VA officials have begun their falling upon swords ritual to save Shinseki according to Fox News. Robert Petzel, undersecretary for health care at the VA has resigned after the grilling he and the Secretary of the Department suffered in a Senate committee hearing yesterday in regards to the Veterans’ Affairs bosses inability to reform the organization;

    The top official for veterans health care has resigned amid a firestorm over long appointment waits, treatment delays and falsified records at VA hospitals.

    Veterans Secretary Eric Shinseki says he has accepted the resignation of Robert Petzel, undersecretary for health care at the VA. It comes the day after both men were grilled by the Senate Committee on Veterans Affairs.

    Well, America’s war veterans will be just as willing to accept Shinseki’s resignation, too.Try us, Ric.

    Thanks to ChipNASA for the link.

  • Did Holder “Misspeak” Yet Again?

    Earlier this week, the US Attorney General Eric Holder announced that the Justice Department had no plans to investigate the VA hospital “secret list” scandal. I noted that in this story.

    Well, it looks like the AG’s remarks on the subject were – to be charitable – inaccurate.  Again.

    Yesterday, the VA’s Acting Inspector General, Richard J. Griffin, disclosed that VA Office of the Inspector General (OIG) personnel are currently working with Federal prosecutors from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Arizona and with personnel from the Public Integrity Section of the Justice Department in Washington, DC. According to Griffin, these individuals are working together to “determine any conduct that we discover that merits criminal prosecution.”

    Hmm.  Last time I checked, both US Attorney’s offices and the Public Integrity Section were part of the Justice Department – which Holder heads. And from what Griffin said yesterday, it certainly looks like they’re “involved in an investigation” at this time. But maybe I’m just confused here.

    It’s simply not plausible to me that the AG would be clueless about what his agency is doing in connection with a matter of extreme public interest.  I don’t believe he is, actually.

    This isn’t the first time that Holder has made public statements (some of them under oath) that later turned out to be inaccurate. Remember Holder’s “erroneous” testimony to Congress concerning “Fast and Furious”?

    Geez.  GMAFB.

    I have to tip my hat to Holder, though. With a straight face, he delivers sworn testimony and other public statements that later are shown to be inaccurate better than anyone in recent memory. The man has talent, and he has chutzpah.

    He has no shame, of course. But he certainly has talent and chutzpah.

    As I said the other day: Holder seems to have forgotten history. He might do well to remember it.

    Why?  Because it wasn’t the Watergate break-in that put former AG John Mitchell in prison. It was his participation in the cover-up.

  • Shinseki vows not to resign

    Shinseki vows not to resign

    Yeah, I’m still watching this thing on CSPAN of Shinseki answering what the Washington Post calls “tough questions”. So he was asked by Senator Dean Heller, Nevada Republican, why he shouldn’t resign from the position at which he’s been such a miserable failure. I’m sure that the definition of “Peter Principle” will be edited to include his photo.

    So Shinseki’s response was recorded by the Post;

    [T]he retired Army general said he took the job “to make things better for veterans” and to “provide as much care and benefits for the people I went to war with” and other veterans as he could. “This is not a job,” he said. “I’m here to accomplish a mission that I think they critically deserve and need.”

    Shinseki vowed to remain in office until he meets his goals for improving the department’s performance or until President Obama tells him it is time to go.

    “Any allegation like this .?.?. makes me mad as hell,” Shinseki said in an opening statement. “But at the same time, it also saddens me.”

    The short answer would have been “I haven’t killed enough veterans yet” apparently. Things under Shinseki haven’t improved even marginally, in all areas of the Veterans’ Affairs Department conditions have deteriorated substantially, so, I’m thinking that Ric is delusional if he thinks that he can improve conditions at the Veterans’ Affairs Department. He even admitted during testimony, that some of the things that need improvement are outside of his abilities. So, WTF is he still doing there?

    {Vermont Senator Bernie] Sanders noted that the VA health system generally receives high marks from patients who use it. The American Customer Satisfaction Index shows that the network, which serves more than 8 million veterans, achieved scores equal to or better than those in the private sector last year.

    I agree with part of that statement. The actual medical treatment at the VA is superb, some of the best doctors and nurses in the country work there, but it’s the bureaucracy that stands between the care and the patients that sucks major ass. And that’s the part that would seem the easiest to fix. All of the complaints about the VA have been about the bureaucracy, since the beginning of time. Fixing that would require some leadership, though, and the VA execs aren’t interested in using any leadership, and Shinseki has never displayed a measure of leadership since he came to my attention more than a decade ago.

    I just don’t know how anyone, including Shinseki, can think that his continued occupation of that position can ever benefit veterans in any way shape or form.

  • Shinseki to face Senate committee

    Shinseki to face Senate committee

    US_Dept_of_Veterans_Affairs

    Department of Veterans’ Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki will face the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee today to explain the countless failures of his agency. From NBC News;

    Veterans Affairs Secretary Eric Shinseki must answer to Congress over allegations that 40 veterans may have died while waiting for care from a Phoenix VA hospital.

    Whistleblowers at the hospital claim supervisors shredded a secret waiting list that buried how long hundreds of veterans were forced to wait before getting treatment. In some cases, it was allegedly months.

    Of course, This Ain’t Hell will represented at the grilling of the Secretary since TSO will be in the room. Concerned Veterans for America send us their 10 questions that they say Shinseki must answer;

    He should be prepared to answer broader questions about VA performance and administration, and to address the need for reform. Here are 10 questions veterans, their families and taxpayers would like to see Secretary Shinseki address when he testifies Thursday:

    1. Since there are now credible allegations from at least five VA facilities that employees manipulated data to make wait times appear shorter, why should we not assume this practice is common to many more, or all, VA facilities?

    2. Given the allegations of manipulation of records at various VA facilities, how can we trust any data reported by the VA?

    3. VA officials have received generous performance bonuses in recent years, but we are now learning that those bonuses may have been based upon fraudulent reporting. What consequences will VA employees who engaged in this fraud face?

    4. You have claimed you have the managerial and administrative tools you need to enact the necessary change at the VA. Why have you not done so? Why has nobody in senior management been fired?

    5. What are you doing to build a culture where people are held accountable for their mistakes?

    6. There are 110 outstanding requests for information from VA for the House Veterans Affairs Committee. Why does it take so long to provide information? How can you expect problems to be fixed when you withhold information from committees that are looking to help?

    7. VA is the second largest federal department. Do you believe that the department is too big to be managed successfully? Why or why not?

    8. What protections against whistleblowers does the VA have to ensure that those who come forward to speak about malfeasance do not face retribution or retaliation?

    9. During your years of service in the U.S. Army, a common command principle held that leaders who failed to perform, or who maintained command over failing missions, are to be replaced. Why does that standard not apply at the VA?

    10. Leading veterans organizations have called for your resignation from the department, suggesting as significant decline in trust from the veterans’ community. What do you plan to do to rebuild that trust?

    I don’t see much coming out of the hearings except Shinseki being portrayed as some sort of hero of the Left and this President because he’s doing exactly what he was hired to accomplish.

  • Hagel: Administration missed warning signs in VA

    Hagel: Administration missed warning signs in VA

    According to the Washington Times, on ABC’s This Week, Sunday, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel admitted that the Obama Administration (and preceding administrations) missed warning signs of the impending malfeasance at the Department of Veterans’ Affairs – probably the closest any member of that cabinet has come to admitting that there’s a problem. But, you know, its Bush’s fault, too.

    “I do support General Shinseki, but there’s no margin here. If this, in fact, or any variation of this occurred, all the way along the chain, accountability is going to have to be upheld here because we can never let this kind of outrage — if all of this is true — stand in this country,” Mr. Hagel said on ABC’s “This Week” on Sunday. “I don’t think it just started with General Shinseki’s term at the VA. This is something that should have been looked at years and years ago. So, yes, we missed it.”

    Yeah, well, there’s no evidence that the gross malfeasance we’ve seen splashed across headlines over the last five years happened before Shinseki began his reign of terror against veterans and the taxpayers. But, you know, Hagel has waged a war against Republicans since he found the political value in it, so….

    However this is still a good sign. Presidents always send a canary into the coalmine to test the political atmosphere. If there is no uproar from the Left about Hagel’s remarks, they may end up ridding themselves of Shinseki. The problem, then, is what nincompoop will they bring in to replace him?

  • VA caught “gaming the system”

    VA caught “gaming the system”

    While Ric Shinseki prepares to lie to Congress again about stuff he knew and stuff he didn’t know, CNN uncovers another whistleblower who says that he was told to “game the system” by bumping veterans (patients) in Wyoming whose appointments will be more than 14 days from the time they were put into the appointment system;

    VA email

    David Newman admits that it’s “gaming the system” but that veterans should know the rules of the game, you know, even though it’s a secret list of patients, so how are veterans supposed to know the “rules”?

    John McCain is calling for jail time for the people involved, according to Stars & Stripes;

    “If these allegations are true, there a violation of law. It’s not a matter of resignations, it’s a matter whether somebody goes to jail or not,” said McCain, evoking thunderous applause from the crowd of more than 100 people.

    Yeah, well, I’ll believe it when i see it. Shinseki has ordered an internal investigation and we’ve seen these investigations at the VA before, so this is me not holding my breath. Meanwhile, we’ve been distracted from the backlogged claims problem, aren’t we?

    The VA clinics in Austin and San Antonio have found a way to deal with whistleblowers according to Stars & Stripes;

    The agency Friday identified the employee as scheduling clerk Philip Brian Turner. He told CNN on Wednesday that he had worked to make it appear as if wait times were shorter than they were at both clinics.

    But Marie Weldon, director of the South Texas Veterans Health Care System based here, told the San Antonio Express-News that the worker had recanted his claim that he had altered medical records at the clinic here in a bid to hide long wait times.

    She said his story changed after the clerk talked with an investigator, but did not know if he had also backed off from his claim concerning the clinic in Austin.

    “As soon as he brought that to our attention, we sat down with the employee and did a fact find where we interviewed him as well as some of the other staff and we could not substantiate his allegations. In fact, he ended up retracting his comments about South Texas,” Weldon said.

    “It was clear to us as well that he was somewhat confused about the process himself of scheduling patients and he was given refresher training as well,” she added.

    No mention whether waterboarding was used in his “re-education” process.

  • Shinseki facing another subpoena

    CNN reports that Congress is contemplating a subpoena summoning Secretary Eric Shinseki to explain to them the failures of his department in regards to their treatment of veterans, you know their whole raison d’être;

    The Shinseki subpoena will cover e-mails that allegedly discussed the destruction of a secret list, first reported by CNN, of veterans waiting for care at a Phoenix VA hospital.

    The panel agreed to issue the subpoena in a voice vote Thursday morning.

    Shinseki is accustomed to Congressional subpoenas. The first time I saw him in person was when I sat behind him while he explained why he bought the first load of berets from China to the House Small Business Committee when they threatened to subpoena his ass.

    Meanwhile, at the White House, they’re circling the wagons around him;

    “The President remains confident in Secretary Shinseki’s ability to lead the department and take appropriate action,” Carney said, repeating the White House response this week to two veterans groups’ calls for Shinseki’s ouster.

    I don’t what there is about him that gives the president any confidence in his abilities because he hasn’t demonstrated a measure of ability to lead anything. He’s an incompetent boob.

    Thanks to ANCCPT for the link.

  • It’s not just Pheonix

    From my paying home……but next time someone says we need to wait and see what happens, send them this……VA

    The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has come under scrunity by Congress, Veteran Service Organizations, media and in the veterans’ community for its failures in leadership performance and accountability which have resulted in quality of care or patient safety issues that have affected veterans.     The following list below outlines specific VA issues nationally as well as at Local VA Medical Centers and Regional Offices.

     

    Nationally

    • VA fails to release internal documents that corroborated at least 19 preventable deaths and VA officials did not respond to direct questions in a House Veterans Oversight and Investigations Hearing on April 2, 2014.

     

    • Florida Governor Scott has convened a state inspection team to examine VA facilities in the wake of quality and patient safety issues.

     

    • At the conclusion of the Congressional Oversight and Investigation Hearing regarding “Correcting ‘Kerfuffles’ – Analyzing Preventable Patient Deaths at Jackson VAMC” on November 13, 2013, Chairman Coffman requested a report on how the G.V. (Sonny) VAMC is specifically addressing the concerns of understaffing, overbooked patients, lack of oversight for the medical center’s nurse practitioners, lack of patients’ access to physicians, and radiology reports being misread and unread within 30 days. On November 14, 2013, The American Legion requested a copy of the report and as of March 31, 2014, the VA has yet to provide the report. During our System Worth Saving Task Force site visit in Jackson MS on January 20-22, facility director Joe Battle was unable to give The American Legion a copy of the action plan the facility has taken to address the preventable deaths.  Director Battle stated that he could release the report because it was not cleared by VA Central Office.   Upon further requests for this information after our site visit, Veterans Health Administration staff told us that they could not release the report because Office of Congressional Legislative Affairs (OCLA) had not cleared or sent this response to Congress.   Not only is Congress waiting for this information but the delays in OCLA responding to Congress have now spilled over and is affecting the abilities of The American Legion to effectively conduct our site visits and inform veterans in the communities of these hospitals.   In anonymous conversations with VA Central Office staff, OCLA was first sent the action plan from VHA on December 6 has not approved or sent the response to Congress.    Furthermore, OCLA just came back to VHA on March 26 to have VHA make adjustments/updates due to the time lag and the information being outdated.

     

    • Congress, Veteran Service Organizations and veterans that are being treated at medical centers with issues and concerns are frustrated, confused and out of the loop on the steps VA has taken to resolve problems which has led to a diminished confidence and renewed interest and pressing for more accountability on management of these facilities.  Veterans in these communities continuously read newspaper articles which are not accurately portraying the action plan and steps VA is taking to correct issues because of the lack of communication and timeliness of VA offices in Washington DC to work together across VA Central Office and in responding to congressional inquiries.

     

    • The American Legion urges VA leadership from the Secretary’s office, Office and Public and Intergovernmental Affairs, the Office of Congressional Legislative Affairs and leadership/communication staff from VHA, VBA and NCA to ALL work together to develop a crisis communication team to expedite issues of critical nature as well as better coordination and response for general inquiries to best serve VA local sites leadership in responding to media, veteran service organizations and veterans.

     

     

     

    St. Louis, Missouri

     

    Fayetteville, NC

    • A December 2012 audit of the Fayetteville VA Medical Center found facility employees did not complete required suicide prevention follow-ups 90 percent of the time for patients at a high risk of suicide. The audit also found the center “noncompliant” in cleanliness of patient care areas, environmental safety, dental clinic safety, training and testing procedures. In July 2012, during an investigation that substantiated patient misdiagnosis complaints, VA’s inspector general found the responsible physician failed to properly review medication information 56 percent of the time, a step that is “critical to appropriate evaluation, treatment planning, and safety.” Fayetteville VA Medical Center Director Elizabeth B. Goolsby received a performance bonus of $7,604 in 2012.

     

    Dallas, Texas (SWS Visit Feb 4-5, 2014)

     

    Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

     

    Phoenix, Arizona (ROAR Visit April 1-4, 2014)

    • Phoenix VA Regional Office Director Sandra Flint has received more than $53,000 in bonuses since 2007 despite a doubling in the office’s backlog of disability compensation claims since 2009.

     

    Columbia, South Carolina (Site Visit Scheduled April 15, 16, 2014)

     

    • In September 2013, six deaths were linked to delayed screenings for colorectal cancer at the veterans medical center in Columbia, S.C., the Veterans Affairs Department reported. The VA’s inspector general determined that the William Jennings Bryan Dorn VA Medical Center fell behind with its screenings because critical nursing positions went unfilled for months. It also found that only about $275,000 of $1 million provided to the hospital to alleviate the backlog had been used over the course of a year.

     

    Waco, Texas

    • Carl Lowe, the former director of the VA regional office in Waco, Texas, raked in more than $53,000 in bonuses as the office’s average disability claims processing time grew to historic levels, forcing veterans to wait longer than anywhere else in the country.

     

    Buffalo, New York

     

    Dayton, Ohio

     

    Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (Site Visit Nov. 5-6, 2013)

     

    Atlanta, Georgia (Site Visit Jan. 28, 2014)

     

    Roseburg, Oregon (Site Visit Jan.9-10, 2014)

    • Ray Velez, an active Legionnaire from American Legion Post 61 in Junction City, went to the Roseburg VA Medical Center this past June for what should have been a routine hernia operation. After the surgery, Roseburg VA Medical Center staff told Irene Lillie, Velez’s daughter, that her father’s blood pressure had “dropped suddenly and he was having difficulty breathing.” Since the Roseburg VA Medical Center does not have an Intensive Care Unit, Velez was taken to PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center at Riverbend in Springfield, Oregon. Unfortunately, Velez passed away en route PeaceHealth Sacred Heart Medical Center due to “intra-dominal bleeding, shock, hyperkalemia, acidosis, respiratory failure and recent ventral hernia surgery.”

     

    Butler, Pennsylvania (Site Visit Jan. 8-9, 2014)

    • An attorney for the prime contractor of a Department of Veterans Affairs outpatient center being built in Butler County declined to comment Friday, July 12, 2013 about the VA’s investigation of the contractor that led the agency to stop work on the $75 million project.

     

    • The VA Butler Healthcare Center was scheduled to open in 2015, but the termination of the lease left its future in doubt. The VA broke ground on the center in April 2013. The Department of Veterans Affairs yanked its lease with an Ohio company that was building a $75 million health center for vets in Butler, accusing the firm of “false and misleading representations” during bidding. The VA ordered work halted in June when it began to uncover problems with the project.

     

     

    • The Department of Veterans Affairs failed to properly check the qualifications of the former developer of an outpatient center in Butler County, according to a highly critical report by the VA’s Office of Inspector General released Monday. The report says the VA improperly calculated that a 20-year lease with Westar Development Co., valued at $157 million, would be cheaper than the VA building and owning the $75 million outpatient center on its own.

     

     

    Orlando, Florida/Denver, Colorado (Orlando SWS Visit-Feb.11-12, 2014) (Denver SWS Visit-May 13-14, 2014)

    • Costs substantially increased and schedules were delayed for Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) largest medical-center construction projects in Denver, Colorado; Las Vegas, Nevada; New Orleans, Louisiana; and Orlando, Florida. As of November 2012, the cost increases for these projects ranged from 59 percent to 144 percent, with a total cost increase of nearly $1.5 billion and an average increase of approximately $366 million. The delays for these projects range from 14 to 74 months, resulting in an average delay of 35 months per project. In commenting on a draft of this report, VA contends that using the initial completion date from the construction contract would be more accurate than using the initial completion date provided to Congress; however, using this date would not account for how VA managed these projects prior to the award of the construction contract. Several factors, including changes to veterans’ health care needs and site-acquisition issues contributed to increased costs and schedule delays at these sites.

     

    Jackson, Mississippi (Site Visit Jan.21-22, 2014)

    • At the G. V. Sonny Montgomery VA Medical Center in Jackson, MS, multiple whistleblower complaints have been raised by employees who were losing confidence in the medical center’s ability to treat veterans. The complaints ranged from improper sterilization of instruments to missed diagnoses of fatal illnesses, as well as hospital management policies.

     

    Augusta, Georgia (Site Visit Mar. 11-12, 2014)

    • CNVAMC leadership first learned of delays in providing gastrointestinal (GI) services to veterans on August 30, 2012.  Of the 4,580 delayed GI consults, a quality management review team determined 81 cases for physician case review.  Seven of the 81 cases may have been adversely affected by delays in care.  Six of seven institutional disclosures were completed and three cancer-related deaths may have been affected by delays in diagnosis. Factors contributing to the 4,580 patient backlogs included an explosion of baby boomers turning 50 and requiring screening, the medical center’s non-anticipation of a spike in GI consult demand, lack of an integrated data base for tracking GI procedures, and GI physician recruitment challenges.

     

    • On Tuesday, April 1, 2014, it was revealed that Veterans Affairs Department financial manager Jed Fillingim was involved in a deadly incident while traveling on business for the agency in 2010. Police and federal investigators found Fillingim drove a government truck after drinking with two colleagues at a bar near Dallas while attending a June 2010 conference for federal employees. One of the two colleagues, Mississippi-based VA employee Amy Wheat, who had also been drinking that night, fell out of the truck while it was moving and died. She suffered severe head injuries and a severed leg in the fall. Blood covered the truck and one of its wheel wells, according to police reports.

     

    • Though he resigned from his position with the agency’s Jackson, Miss., medical center five months later, the News4 I-Team has learned Fillingim was rehired in March 2011 and has since assumed a high-level managerial position in Augusta, Ga., earning more than $100,000 per year.

     

    Memphis, Tennessee

    • In October of 2013, The VA Office of Inspector General Office (VA OIG) of Healthcare Inspections conducted an inspection in response to an allegation of inadequate care for patients who died in the Emergency Department (ED) at the Memphis VA Medical Center (the facility), Memphis, TN. The complainant alleged that a patient died after a physician ordered a medication for which the patient had a known drug allergy; another patient died after being administered multiple sedating drugs and not being monitored properly; and a third patient died after delays in getting treatment for very high blood pressure.

     

    Des Moines, Iowa

    • The VA Office of Inspector General Office of Healthcare Inspections conducted an inspection in response to a request by Senators Charles Grassley and Tom Harkin, both of whom received allegations of ongoing administrative irregularities, leadership lapses, and quality of care concerns over the past 2 years at the VA Central Iowa Health Care System.

     

    San Francisco, California

    • In a VA Inspector General report on the San Francisco VA hospital and clinic, the agency’s inspector general reviewed 264 opiate prescription renewals and found that in 53 percent of cases, the doctor renewing the prescription had not seen the patient or talked to him or her over the telephone.