Patients in Imminent Danger at DC Veterans Affairs Hospital: Report

WASHINGTON, DC — An alarming new report from the Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Inspector General warns that patients at the Washington, D.C. VA Medical Center in Northwest are in imminent danger due to "serious and troubling deficiencies at the VAMC that place patients at unnecessary risk."

Among the serious safety lapses uncovered by the Inspector General included a lack of a system to ensure supplies and equipment subject to safety recalls were not used on patients; 18 of 25 sterile satellite storage areas for supplies were dirty; and no effective inventory system for managing medical equipment availability.

"Although our work is continuing, we believed it important to publish this Interim Summary Report given the exigent nature of the issues we have preliminarily identified and the lack of confidence in VHA to adequately and timely fix the root causes of these issues," the report states. "At least some of these issues have been known to the Veterans Health Administration senior management for some time without effective remediation."

While Veterans Affairs did take several immediate actions to address these issues after being notified March 30, the Inspector General "feels that these actions are short-term and insufficient to ensure the implementation of an effective inventory management system at the VAMC."

“OIG became aware of potentially serious patient care issues at the Washington, DC, Medical Center and promptly deployed our Rapid Response Team to investigate,” Michael J. Missal, Inspector General, U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Office of Inspector General, said in the report (PDF). “Part of OIG’s mission is to monitor the quality of patient care and outcomes for veteran patients who rely on VA for their health care. When we become aware of deficiencies at VA that place patients at unnecessary risk, we will act immediately and aggressively to address those deficiencies.”

Image via Washington D.C. VA Medical Center