Get Back to Mission

“We now know there is a leadership and integrity problem among some of the leaders of our health care facilities, which can and must be fixed.  That breach of integrity is indefensible,” said then acting Veterans Administration Secretary, Sloan Gibson in June, 2014. The VA experienced long waiting lists and kept double sets of books as well as secret lists of unseen veterans. Veterans may even have died while waiting to be seen.

Measurements seemed more important than mission in many parts of the VA. A White House audit revealed that 13%of schedulers reported that supervisors told them to falsify wait times to make them appear shorter than they were. In fact, The inspector general had issued numerous reports in recent years that identified scheduling deficiencies, resulting in lengthy wait times and negative impact on patient care.