posted May 15, 2014 10:34 PM            

Nice going O'Bomber. You lying little America hating Marxist. Hang them high!

A fatal wait: Veterans languish and die on a VA hospital's secret list

CNN has been reporting on delays in appointments and veterans' deaths
New revelations of 40 deaths involving Phoenix VA are perhaps the most disturbing yet

Retired VA doctor says there's an official wait list that he calls a sham
He says the real list is kept secret and has wait times that stretch into the months

(CNN) -- At least 40 U.S. veterans died waiting for appointments at the Phoenix Veterans Affairs Health Care system, many of whom were placed on a secret waiting list.

The secret list was part of an elaborate scheme designed by Veterans Affairs managers in Phoenix who were trying to hide that 1,400 to 1,600 sick veterans were forced to wait months to see a doctor, according to a recently retired top VA doctor and several high-level sources.

For six months, CNN has been reporting on extended delays in health care appointments suffered by veterans across the country and who died while waiting for appointments and care. But the new revelations about the Phoenix VA are perhaps the most disturbing and striking to come to light thus far.

Internal e-mails obtained by CNN show that top management at the VA hospital in Arizona knew about the practice and even defended it.

Dr. Sam Foote just retired after spending 24 years with the VA system in Phoenix. The veteran doctor told CNN in an exclusive interview that the Phoenix VA works off two lists for patient appointments:

There's an "official" list that's shared with officials in Washington and shows the VA has been providing timely appointments, which Foote calls a sham list. And then there's the real list that's hidden from outsiders, where wait times can last more than a year.

"The scheme was deliberately put in place to avoid the VA's own internal rules," said Foote in Phoenix. "They developed the secret waiting list," said Foote, a respected local physician.

The VA requires its hospitals to provide care to patients in a timely manner, typically within 14 to 30 days, Foote said.

According to Foote, the elaborate scheme in Phoenix involved shredding evidence to hide the long list of veterans waiting for appointments and care. Officials at the VA, Foote says, instructed their staff to not actually make doctor's appointments for veterans within the computer system.

Instead, Foote says, when a veteran comes in seeking an appointment, "they enter information into the computer and do a screen capture hard copy printout. They then do not save what was put into the computer so there's no record that you were ever here," he said.

According to Foote, the information was gathered on the secret electronic list and then the information that would show when veterans first began waiting for an appointment was actually destroyed.

"That hard copy, if you will, that has the patient demographic information is then taken and placed onto a secret electronic waiting list, and then the data that is on that paper is shredded," Foote said.

"So the only record that you have ever been there requesting care was on that secret list," he said. "And they wouldn't take you off that secret list until you had an appointment time that was less than 14 days so it would give the appearance that they were improving greatly the waiting times, when in fact they were not."

I feel very sorry for the people who work at the Phoenix VA. They all wish they could leave 'cause they know what they're doing is wrong.

Foote estimates right now the number of veterans waiting on the "secret list" to see a primary care physician is somewhere between 1,400 and 1,600.

Doctor: It's a 'frustrated' staff

"I feel very sorry for the people who work at the Phoenix VA," said Foote. "They're all frustrated. They're all upset. They all wish they could leave 'cause they know what they're doing is wrong.

"But they have families, they have mortgages and if they speak out or say anything to anybody about it, they will be fired and they know that."

Several other high-level VA staff confirmed Foote's description to CNN and confirmed this is exactly how the secret list works in Phoenix.

Foote says the Phoenix wait times reported back to Washington were entirely fictitious. "So then when they did that, they would report to Washington, 'Oh yeah. We're makin' our appointments within -- within 10 days, within the 14-day frame,' when in reality it had been six, nine, in some cases 21 months," he said.

Thomas Breen was so proud of his time in the Navy that he wanted to be treated only at a VA facility, his family says
.
In the case of 71-year-old Navy veteran Thomas Breen, the wait on the secret list ended much sooner.

"We had noticed that he started to have bleeding in his urine," said Teddy Barnes-Breen, his son. "So I was like, 'Listen, we gotta get you to the doctor.' "

Teddy says his Brooklyn-raised father was so proud of his military service that he would go nowhere but the VA for treatment. On September 28, 2013, with blood in his urine and a history of cancer, Teddy and his wife, Sally, rushed his father to the Phoenix VA emergency room, where he was examined and sent home to wait.

"They wrote on his chart that it was urgent," said Sally, her father-in-law's main caretaker. The family has obtained the chart from the VA that clearly states the "urgency" as "one week" for Breen to see a primary care doctor or at least a urologist, for the concerns about the blood in the urine.

"And they sent him home," says Teddy, incredulously.

Sally and Teddy say Thomas Breen was given an appointment with a rheumatologist to look at his prosthetic leg but was given no appointment for the main reason he went in.

The Breens wait ... and wait ... and wait ...

No one called from the VA with a primary care appointment. Sally says she and her father-in-law called "numerous times" in an effort to try to get an urgent appointment for him. She says the response they got was less than helpful.

"Well, you know, we have other patients that are critical as well," Sally says she was told. "It's a seven-month waiting list. And you're gonna have to have patience."

Sally says she kept calling, day after day, from late September to October. She kept up the calls through November. But then she no longer had reason to call.

Thomas Breen died on November 30. The death certificate shows that he died from Stage 4 bladder cancer. Months after the initial visit, Sally says she finally did get a call.

"They called me December 6. He's dead already."

Sally says the VA official told her, "We finally have that appointment. We have a primary for him.' I said, 'Really, you're a little too late, sweetheart.' "

At the end is when he suffered. He screamed. He cried.
Sally Brenn on the death of her father-in-law

Sally says her father-in-law realized toward the end he was not getting the care he needed.

"At the end is when he suffered. He screamed. He cried. And that's somethin' I'd never seen him do before, was cry. Never. Never. He cried in the kitchen right here. 'Don't let me die.' "

Teddy added his father said: "Why is this happening to me? Why won't anybody help me?"

Teddy added: "They didn't do the right thing." Sally said: "No. They neglected Pop."

First hidden -- and then removed

Foote says Breen is a perfect example of a veteran who needed an urgent appointment with a primary doctor and who was instead put on the secret waiting list -- where he remained hidden.

Foote adds that when veterans waiting on the secret list die, they are simply removed.

"They could just remove you from that list, and there's no record that you ever came to the VA and presented for care. ... It's pretty sad."

Foote said that the number of dead veterans who died waiting for care is at least 40.

"That's correct. The number's actually higher. ... I would say that 40, there's more than that that I know of, but 40's probably a good number."

CNN has obtained e-mails from July 2013 showing that top management, including Phoenix VA Director Sharon Helman, was well-aware about the actual wait times, knew about the electronic off-the-books list and even defended its use to her staff.

I think it's unfair to call any of this a success when Veterans are waiting 6 weeks on an electronic waiting list
From 2013 Phoenix VA e-mail obtained by CNN

In one internal Phoenix VA e-mail dated July 3, 2013, one staffer raised concerns about the secret electronic list and raised alarms that Phoenix VA officials were praising its use.

"I have to say, I think it's unfair to call any of this a success when Veterans are waiting 6 weeks on an electronic waiting list before they're called to schedule their first PCP (primary care physician) appointment," the e-mail states. "Sure, when their appointment is created, it can be 14 days out, but we're making them wait 6-20 weeks to create that appointment."

The e-mail adds pointedly: "That is unethical and a disservice to our Veterans."

Last year and earlier this year, Foote also sent letters to officials at the VA Office of the Inspector General with details about the secret electronic waiting list and about the large number of veterans who died waiting for care, many hidden on the secret list. Foote and several other sources inside the Phoenix VA confirmed to CNN that IG inspectors have interviewed them about the allegations.

VA: 'It is disheartening to hear allegations'

CNN has made numerous requests to Helman and her staff for an interview about the secret list, the e-mails showing she was aware of it and the allegations of the 40 veterans who died waiting on the list, to no avail.

But CNN was sent a statement from VA officials in Texas, quoting Helman.

"It is disheartening to hear allegations about Veterans care being compromised," the statement from Helman reads, "and we are open to any collaborative discussion that assists in our goal to continually improve patient care."

Just before deadline Wednesday, the VA sent an additional comment to CNN.

It stated, in part: "We have conducted robust internal reviews since these allegations surfaced and welcome the results from the Office of Inspector General's review. We take these allegations seriously."

The VA statement to CNN added: "To ensure new Veterans waiting for appointments are managed appropriately, we maintain an Electronic Wait List (EWL) in accordance with the national VHA Scheduling Directive. The ability of new and established patients to get more timely care has showed significant improvement in the last two years which is attributable to increased budget, staffing, efficiency and infrastructure."

Foote says Helman's response in the first statement is stunning, explaining the entire secret list and the reason for its existence was planned and created by top management at the Phoenix VA, specifically to avoid detection of the long wait times by veterans there.

"This was a plan that involved the Pentad, which includes the director, the associate director, the assistant director, the chief of nursing, along with the medical chief of staff -- in collaboration with the chief of H.A.S."

The Phoenix VA's "off the books" waiting list has now gotten the attention of the U.S. House Veterans Affairs Committee in Washington, whose chairman has been investigating delays in care at veterans hospitals across the country.

According to Rep. Jeff Miller, chairman of the House Committee on Veterans' Affairs, what was happening in Phoenix is even worse than veterans dying while waiting for care.

Even as CNN was working to report this story, the Florida Republican demanded the VA preserve all records in anticipation of a congressional investigation.

In a hearing on April 9, Miller learned even the undersecretary of health for the VA wasn't being told the truth about the secret list:

"It appears as though there could be as many as 40 veterans whose deaths could be related to delays in care. Were you made aware of these unofficial lists in any part of your look back?" asked Miller.

"Mr. Chairman, I was not," replied Dr. Thomas Lynch, assistant deputy undersecretary, Veterans Health Administration.

Congress has now ordered all records in Phoenix, secret or not, be preserved.

That would include the record of a 71-year-old Navy veteran named Thomas Breen.

Tears, angry accusations mark hearing on delayed VA care

posted May 20, 2014 10:05 AM            

Perhaps you don't know what was in that veterans bill. You think just because "Veterans" was used in the name of the bill that republicans are responsible for the deaths of more than 40 veterans in an Arizona...Phoenix...veterans hospital.

But, these falsified secret treatment lists were in play long before the bill republicans refused to vote for was submitted for congressional votes.

Sorry but your allegation isn't going to fly. It defies reality. O'Bomber was told..specifically, about the long waiting list problems at VA hospitals between the time he was elected and before he began infesting the White House. It's only gotten worse under the Marxist Messiah O'Bomber. A lot worse, though O'Bomber promised to "fix the problems".

It's just another O'Bomber lie and another O'Bomber scandal that killed people.

VA treatment is a true "Single Payer" system...for Veterans. This is the health care system leftists pant, pine, screech and shriek for...and it kills people. This is the very same "Single Payer" health care system O'Bomber said it would take about 15 years to transition to...and it kills patients who have no other options for treatment.

posted May 20, 2014 11:44 AM            

The deaths are being investigated and the reasons therefor..meanwhile no additional funds are being made available. Generally slow service in hospitals is down to having to pick and choose whom they can afford to ccare for.

But the Republicans have systematically stymied all aid bills that didn't benefit the biggest pockets around, and continue to do so. Refusing to fund Vet programs doesn't help prevent corruption and inefficiency.

Long waiting lists abound in all sectors of the medical industry. Even Dick Cheney had to wait for his transplant heart, though his taxpayer paid healthcare made sure he could function without one lol.

I suggest you stop pretending you know what I think and when I ask questions, answer them instead of misinterpreting to make another attack. The old codger routine is getting VERY old. Has been for years.

posted May 21, 2014 03:06 PM            

Let’s take a stroll down “death panel” memory lane. Here are just a few excerpts for you to draw your own conclusions.

My Facebook Post on August 7, 2009:

“And who will suffer the most when they ration care? The sick, the elderly, and the disabled, of course. The America I know and love is not one in which my parents or my baby with Down Syndrome will have to stand in front of Obama’s ‘death panel’ so his bureaucrats can decide, based on a subjective judgment of their ‘level of productivity in society,’ whether they are worthy of health care. Such a system is downright evil.”

Politifact declared my statement “Lie of the Year.” August 10, 2009, is their first claim:

“We agree with Palin that such a system would be evil. But it's definitely not what President Barack Obama or any other Democrat has proposed.”

Hot Air yesterday, May 15, 2014:

“VA Secretary Eric Shinseki declared himself ‘mad as hell’ over the allegations of wait-list fraud in Phoenix, where 40 veterans passed away before accessing medical assistance while the office falsified records.”

Daily Caller yesterday, May 15, 2014:

“When individuals receive care through the VA, it becomes the only payer and hence, the only decision-maker. The VA decides who gets care, when, and how much. Moreover, as the single payer, the VA bears the risk of loss: If tax dollars aren’t enough to pay for the care demanded, there’s only one result —rationing of care.”

Again, remember what the influential (to other sheep in their leftist herd anyway) Politifact wrote about this “Lie of the Year”:

“We agree with Palin that such a system would be evil. But it's definitely not what President Barack Obama or any other Democrat has proposed.”

Las Vegas Sun on August 10, 2013:

“[Senator Harry] Reid said he thinks the country has to ‘work our way past’ insurance-based health care during a Friday night appearance on Vegas PBS’ program Nevada Week in Review. ‘What we’ve done with Obamacare is have a step in the right direction, but we’re far from having something that’s going to work forever,’ Reid said. When then asked by panelist Steve Sebelius whether he meant ultimately the country would have to have a health care system that abandoned insurance as the means of accessing it [by moving to a single-payer system instead], Reid said: ‘Yes, yes. Absolutely, yes.’”

And Barack Obama himself warned he wanted single-payer! June 30, 2003: “I happen to be a proponent of a single-payer health care plan.”

Obama repeatedly warned America: http://youtu.be/Kvg8qVKZYuM. So, media, your average Joe Six Pack American (i.e. me) caught those warnings, and YOU didn’t? Riiight.

I love this American Awakening when finally more voters can’t say they weren’t warned. Stamped with the media’s “Lie of the Year”, I had the sticky label on my back for years used as convenient “proof” that commonsense conservatives just don’t know what we’re talking about. Denouncing from the Orwellian Left and a squishy Right ensued. But the truth stares us in the face and pocketbook, especially as we see the unworkable Obamacare.

What happens next is the Left will subtly suggest moving America toward a single-payer system, which was their intention all along. Watch for this gradual, but driving, descent into statism.

So, are you still relying on Obamacare to help and not hurt you? On the Democrat’s watch, health care in the hands of unaccountable bureaucrats proves Reagan’s adage that government is not the solution; government is the problem.

And speaking of the VA scandal, we’ve seen how Obama merely gives lip service to his bureaucrats “investigating” his bureaucracy, so don’t be surprised if he finds nothing wrong in the government’s VA health system – “NOT EVEN A SMIDGEN”!

posted May 21, 2014 10:35 PM            

Sarah Palin deals in facts.

posted May 22, 2014 10:09 AM            

So far, we know about 40 or so vets who died on waiting lists for emergency health care in Phoenix.

So far, VA hospitals in 26 other states have been identified as using the same secret waiting list. We don't know how many died waiting to see a doctor in those hospitals.

Make no mistake; everyone who works in the Executive Branch of the Federal government works for Barack Hussein O'Bomber. He's also the Commander in Chief of US military forces..and these are military veterans.

posted May 23, 2014 12:24 AM            

The problem is that O'Bomber is in way over his head. He's not intellectually capable of handling the job he campaigned for and was elected to do.

It's been one scandal after another and O'Bomber's explanation is always..."I found out about it when you did...when the news broke in the news media". Yet, all these agency heads report directly to O'Bomber.

posted May 23, 2014 09:15 AM            

WASHINGTON — It’s one of those promises the president would probably like to forget.

In vowing to make the Veterans Administration the model of national health-care reform back in 2008, the outlook for scandal-plagued Obamacare suddenly seems even worse.

WND has discovered that during his transition into the White House in 2008-09, President Obama proposed in his “Obama-Biden” plan to “make the VA a leader of national health care reform so that veterans get the best care possible.”

However, instead of fixing the VA, the administration has had to defend its role in the death of veterans by neglect.

The story became a national sensation on April 14, when CNN reported that at least 40 U.S. veterans died waiting for appointments at the Phoenix VA, many of whom were placed on a secret waiting list.

The discovery of the Obama-Biden VA plan fits a pattern that has come to light this week in which Obama repeatedly warned, or was warned, about serious problems at the VA, but apparently did little about it.

In the document labeled the Obama-Biden Plan from the Office of the President Elect, Obama makes a series of promises to veterans, including:

•Fix the Benefits Bureaucracy: Hire additional claims workers, and improve training and accountability so that VA benefit decisions are rated fairly and consistently. Transform the paper benefit claims process to an electronic one to reduce errors and improve timeliness.

•Strengthen VA Care: Make the VA a leader of national health care reform so that veterans get the best care possible. Improve care for polytrauma vision impairment, prosthetics, spinal cord injury, aging, and women’s health.

•Fully Fund VA Medical Care: Fully fund the VA so it has all the resources it needs to serve the veterans who need it, when they need it. Establish a world-class VA Planning Division to avoid future budget shortfalls.

The Obama-Biden plan seems to have fallen so far short of its promise to “Fix the Benefits Bureaucracy” that the VA itself has admitted 23 vets have died waiting for care, and investigations of possible death-by-neglect have spread to 26 VA facilities around the country.

As WND has reported, Obama was warned about severe problems at the VA repeatedly over the years, even before he became president.

•WND discovered that Obama was briefed on problems at the VA as far back as 2005, when he was a senator and a member of the Veterans Affairs committee.

•In a 2007 speech, Sen. Obama said, “Keeping faith with those who serve must always be a core American value and a cornerstone of American patriotism. Because America’s commitment to its servicemen and women begins at enlistment, and it must never end.”

•The Washington Times reported Monday that the Obama administration received notice more than five years ago that VA medical facilities were reporting inaccurate waiting times and experiencing scheduling failures that threatened to deny veterans timely health care.

•VA officials reportedly warned the Obama-Biden transition team in the weeks after the 2008 presidential election that the wait times the facilities were reporting were not trustworthy.

•More recently, House Veterans Affairs Committee Chairman Jeff Miller, R-Fla., wrote a letter to Obama on May 21, 2013, that warned: “an alarming pattern of serious and significant patient care issues at the Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Centers (VAMCs) across the country … (including) failures, deceptions, and lack of accountability permeating VA’s healthcare system … I believe your direct involvement and leadership is required.”

•And, WND reported last week that Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., reminded VA Secretary Eric Shinseki that Congress had been informed two years ago that gaming the system at the VA was so widespread, employees would look to get around regulations as soon as the rules were implemented.

Democrats have been quick to say the problems were caused by an increase in veterans in the system due to the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that the solution is to increase spending on the VA.

Sen. Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., said, “If the VA does not have enough doctors to see these patients, then these problems are a result of a lack of funding.”

On Sunday’s “Meet the Press,” NBC News chief Pentagon reporter Jim Miklaszewski claimed, “You have a VA that is overwhelmed and under-resourced,” adding, “There’s just not enough money right now in the federal government to fix it.”

However, John Merline at Investor’s Business Daily crunched the numbers and found that just wasn’t true.

On the contrary, he found the VA’s budget has been exploding, even as the number of veterans steadily declines.

VA spending nearly tripled from 2000 to 2013, while the population of veterans declined by 4.3 million.

Even more telling, wounded warriors coming back from Iraq and Afghanistan are not increasing treatment costs.

Those vets are actually far cheaper to treat than aging vets.

A Congressional Budget Office report found that they cost $4,800, on average, in 2010 compared with $8,800 for other veterans who used the system.

It also found, while these Iraq and Afghan vets account for 7 percent of those treated, they were responsible for only 4 percent of its health costs.

Iraq and Afghan vets, the report found, “are typically younger and healthier than the average VHA patient and as a result are less expensive to treat.”

Still, the VA scandal keeps exploding, with no signs of slowing down. VA Secretary Shinseki had testified before the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee last week that he was not aware of problems similar to those in Phoenix at other VA facilities, except in isolated cases. But emboldened whistleblowers have now identified 26 VA facilities around the country experiencing similar problems.

Just Thursday, an attorney claimed her client died of neglect by the Seattle Veterans Affairs hospital.

The attorney said Donald Douglass had a small spot on his forehead confirmed as cancerous when he went to the Seattle VA hospital in 2011, but it was four months before the hospital scheduled an appointment for him to have it removed — and by then, it had spread, wrapping around a facial nerve and eventually getting into his blood.

According to attorney Jessica Holman, “Had he had his surgery timely, he’d be alive today.”

In Miami, a criminal investigator for the VA police department in South Florida went to a local television station because, he said, the VA told him to stop investigating drug deals on hospital grounds.

“People are dying,” Detective Thomas Fiore said, “and there are so many things that are going on there that people need to know about.”

Fiore claimed illegal drug deals area occur daily at the hospital, involving, “Anything from your standard prescription drugs like OxyContin, Vicodin, Percocet, and of course marijuana, cocaine, heroin, I’ve come across them all.”

He says he was even stopped from investigating reports of missing drugs from the VA pharmacy by the official in charge.

“I was instructed that I was to stop conducting investigations pertaining to controlled substance discrepancies,” by the hospital’s chief of staff, Dr. Vincent DeGennaro, said Fiore.

The growing scandal could affect upcoming elections, because if the VA problems offer a preview of government-run health insurance, then Republicans may be rapidly acquiring explosive new ammunition in their efforts to repeal and replace Obamacare.

Former AP Washington Bureau Chief Ron Fournier, now with National Journal, said Obama’s poor handling of the mismanagement at the Department of Veterans Affairs could plague his presidency as an all-time low point.

“The president has known the VA has been a mess for a long time, and hasn’t done anything to get it fixed,” he said. “It’s gotten worse recently — at least for the last two years, we’ve known we’ve had these problems and nothing’s been done,” said Fournier.

However, leading liberals have long touted the VA as an efficient model of government-run health care.

New York times columnist Paul Krugman called the VA a “huge success story” in 2011, saying “[I]t’s free from the perverse incentives created when doctors and hospitals profit from expensive tests and procedures, whether or not those procedures actually make medical sense.”

Krugman added, “Yes, this is ‘socialized medicine’ … But it works, and suggests what it will take to solve the troubles of US health care more broadly.”

posted May 24, 2014 09:46 AM            

There's no waiting list for terrorists to see a doctor at Gitmo!

Guantanamo

Al Qaeda terrorists at Guantanamo treated better than our vets
J.D. Gordon
May 23, 2014

President Obama finally addressed the nation Wednesday about the growing scandal at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. After meeting with VA Secretary Eric Shinseki he pledged to hold folks accountable.

Thanks, Mr. President.

By now most American have heard about the VA’s infamous patient “secret wait lists” which reportedly contributed to the deaths of up to 40 veterans in the Phoenix area alone. Those patriots were American heroes who served our country proudly. Yet they were left to die waiting to see a doctor.

While the Gitmo (medical staff) ratio is 1.5 to 1, for America’s 9 million veterans receiving VA health care and 267,930 VA employees, the ratio is 35 to 1.

Here’s another secret the White House doesn’t want you to know about the VA. Al Qaeda detainees get better medical treatment than our veterans.

Say what?

Yes, it’s true. I know because I served as a Pentagon spokesman from 2005-2009 and visited Guantanamo Bay Naval Base over 30 times during those years.

Despite the fact that Al Qaeda terrorists carried out the Sept. 11 terror attacks, killing 3,000 people in America, the admitted co-conspirators and their roughly 150 fellow jihadists at Gitmo have approximately 100 doctors, nurses and health care personnel assigned to them.

Doctors and medical personnel are at their beck and call. Got a cold, a fever, a toothache, a tumor, chest or back pain, mental health issues, PTSD? No problem, come right on in. Military doctors are waiting to see you.

The VA and Gitmo eligible patient-to-health care provider ratios speak volumes.

While the Gitmo ratio is 1.5 to 1, for America’s 9 million veterans receiving VA health care and 267,930 VA employees, the ratio is 35 to 1.

But beyond the Gitmo numbers, the situation at the VA is also a bright, shining example of misguided priorities and terrible mismanagement.

In late 2008, when Obama was president-elect, he and his staff were warned not to trust the wait times reported by VA health care facilities. But instead of fixing the problem, their focus was closing Guantanamo and improving the comfort of detainees. Even though they already lived under some of the best prison conditions ever seen.

While some who see “2008” may reflexively say, “blame Bush, not Obama” the fact is that the VA’s health system has been fatally flawed for years, regardless of who has been the president.

The VA is a classic example of big government gone wild. It is America’s second largest cabinet agency after the Defense Department. Since civil service promotions are traditionally based more on seniority than performance, and it’s near impossible to fire anyone, there’s a punch-the-clock mentality that’s pervasive. Not surprisingly, there's little to no sense of urgency. So to instill incentives, the VA shells out high salaries and bonuses, deserved or not.

According to a Fox News report, Phoenix VA hospital paid staff up to $357,000 for doctor executives and $147,000 for nursing staff. On average, doctors and nurses in Phoenix make just over half those figures.

Meanwhile, the gardening budget at Phoenix VA hospital was over $180,000 in 2013. The facility also spent $211,000 on interior design over the past three years.

If any government entity ever needed a complete overhaul, it’s the VA. If it were in the private sector, it would have been shuttered long ago.

Today’s VA has near zero accountability, while labor unions fight to protect employees who aren't doing their jobs. Shinseki and his senior staff should be the first to go.

President Obama needs to refocus his priorities. There must be less time, effort and energy caring for Al Qaeda and Taliban detainees at Gitmo and much more attention put on caring for America's veterans.

Our veterans have served the nation proudly. In many cases they were gravely wounded during their service and now will require a lifetime of medical support. Every one of them deserves better.

J.D. Gordon is a retired Navy Commander who served as a Pentagon spokesman in the Office of the Secretary of Defense from 2005-09

posted June 20, 2014 08:43 AM            

The administrators at the Veterans Administration have apparently been busy while old soldiers waited to see a doctor, after all. Serving those who served is not necessarily a priority, but saving the planet is Job 1. Solar panels and windmills can be more important than the touch of a healing hand.

The department early on set up an Office of Green Management Programs designed to “help VA facilities nationwide recognize opportunities to green VA, and to reward innovative ‘green’ practices and efforts by individual facilities and staff within the VA.” This sometimes means paying more attention to greening the department and saving the polar ice caps than to health care.

In the department’s words, it adopted a far more important mission to “become more energy efficient and sustainable, focusing primarily on renewable energy, energy and water efficiency, [carbon-dioxide] emissions reduction, and sustainable buildings.”

The green office isn’t merely a desk and telephone tucked away in the dark corner of a nondescript government building. It’s a substantial undertaking, with all the luxury, bells and whistles of a bureaucracy that means business. Eric K. Shinseki, who resigned as secretary in the wake of the VA scandal of the sin of omission, traveled the country to boast of the green initiative. In one instance, he traveled to Massachusetts to flick the switch at a half-million-dollar windmill project at the Massachusetts National Cemetery. “Nationally,” he said, “VA continues to expand its investment in renewable sources of energy to promote our nation’s energy independence, save taxpayer dollars, and improve care for our veterans and their families.

VA facilities have become littered with every scheme to banish carbon dioxide short of requiring visitors to hold their breath. Calverton National Cemetery spent $742,034 on solar panels. Fort Rosecrans National Cemetery spent $787,308. Not to be out-greened, the Riverside National Cemetery spent $1.3 million on its solar system.

At the Phoenix VA Health Care System, where 20 Americans died from incompetence and cover-up, the department spent $20 million putting solar panels on the hospital roofs. That would have been more than enough money to provide the veterans with the health care they deserved.

Some administrators won’t be satisfied until every federal building bears a green stamp. In military parlance, the VA is practicing “mission creep,” the expansion of a project well beyond its intended goals. While the rest of the government continues to waste taxpayer funds trying to become carbon-dioxide neutral, the VA should be spending every available dollar to relieve pain, cure the sick and restore the deserving to health. That’s more important than any fad, environmental or otherwise.

posted July 02, 2014 08:46 AM            

Awww, too bad!!! He died 2 years BEFORE his widow got the notice to make an appointment with a primary care doctor at the VA facility in Bedford.

Notice, he had been diagnosed with a brain tumor by a specialist?? at another medical facility. But, the VA wanted him to make an appointment to see a VA primary care doctor...then, he could possibly have gotten on the waiting list to see an oncologist. Too bad he died 2 years before the notice directing him to make that appointment.

The Veterans Administration administers the only SINGLE PAYER HEALH CARE SYSTEM in America.

This is the very same health care system leftist knuckleheads want for all Americans, Single Payer...Government run health care. Oh, and never mind that it's a killer everywhere it exists.

I-Team: Acton Vet Finally Gets VA Doctor’s Appointment – 2 Years After He Died
By WBZ-TV Chief Correspondent Joe Shortsleeve
June 30, 2014

“He was steadfast. He took care of us, all of these years.”

Suzanne Chase of Acton was talking about her husband, Doug, a Vietnam veteran who was diagnosed with a brain tumor in 2011.

In 2012, she tried to move his medical care to the Veterans Affairs hospital in Bedford.

“It was so difficult for him to take the ambulance ride into Boston, we wanted to be closer.”

They waited about four months and never heard anything. Then Douglas Chase died in August 2012.

But two weeks ago, he got a letter, from the VA in Bedford, saying he could now call to make an appointment to see a primary care doctor.

“It was addressed to my husband and I opened it,” said Suzanne Chase. “I was in complete disbelief.”

Suzanne Chase was denied funeral benefits for her husband because he was never treated at a VA hospital, even though he died after waiting four months for an appointment.

Chase says she will never forget that walk from the mailbox. “It was 22 months too late, I kind of thought I was in the twilight zone when I opened this letter and read it.”

At the bottom of the letter, dated June 12, it reads: “We are committed to providing primary care in a timely manner and would greatly appreciate a prompt response.”

“I was like you have to be kidding, right,” Chase recalled.

She says the VA had to know her husband was dead because she applied for funeral benefits two years ago and was denied.

The reason for the denial: Her husband was never treated at a VA hospital.

“It is absurd,” said Chase. “It made me angry because I just don’t think our veterans should be treated this way.”

She wrote a letter to the Bedford VA two weeks ago, but once again, no response.

“I am hoping if other people speak out, they can improve the system, so no one else dies waiting for an appointment.”

When WBZ contacted the VA and told them about this I-Team story, the media person’s initial response was simply: “Oh, dear.”

In response to an inquiry from the I-Team about Douglas Chase, the Department of Veterans Affairs issued the following statement:

“We regret any distress our actions caused to the Veteran’s widow and family.

“At the Department of Veterans Affairs, Veterans Health Administration, our most important mission is to provide the high quality health care and benefits Veterans have earned and deserve – where and when they need it.

“Thank you for bringing this regrettable issue to our attention. We apologize for our error and any difficulties this has caused you. We will examine our process, do what we can to fix it, and institute measures to prevent this from happening again.....