WASHINGTON, Sept. 9 – Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) today issued the following statement at a hearing on the state of VA health care.

“Today we will be discussing some of the very serious issues facing the Department of Veterans Affairs on the heels of the inspector general’s findings relating to long wait times and poor patient care at the Phoenix VA. The IG’s report provides trouble details about a facility that failed to meet our nation’s obligation to provide timely, quality care to veterans. What happened in Phoenix is inexcusable and must never happen again in any VA facility.

“I was especially disappointed to learn the extent to which Phoenix VA executives and senior clinical staff knew about inappropriate scheduling practices. In a telling exchange, when asked by a physician in Hawaii to share best practices about how the Phoenix VA had presumably been able to reduce its patient wait time from 238 days to down to 7 days – quite a feat – the chief of primary care emailed one of his fellow colleagues in Phoenix and stated, ‘Wonderful, not sure how to answer this. Can I just say, smoke and mirrors?’ And of course that’s what it was- it was all smoke and mirrors.

“The people who lied, who acted dishonorably, who manipulated data in Phoenix and elsewhere clearly must be held accountable. The endemic nature of this problem, as identified by the IG’s report, cannot be tolerated. The IG’s report detailed numerous cases of poor patient care. In fact, several of those cases raised serious concerns about two of Phoenix’s specialty care clinics. Reviews of patient files found problems with continuity of mental health care, delays in assignment to a dedicated psychiatrist (or mental health nurse or practitioner) and limited access to psychotherapy. Additionally the IG also discovered the urology service struggled to provide primary care, In fact the IG has launched a separate investigation into this service. A report regarding the findings will be released in due course.

“While the results of the IG’s reports paint a troublesome picture, the IG was ‘unable to conclusively assert that patients died because of long waiting lines’ as news media reports have speculated. I also understand that as a result of the attention focused on Phoenix, the IG has opened additional investigations in 93 sites of care as a result of receiving approximately 445 allegations regarding manipulated wait times at other VA facilities. This committee will continue to monitor the results of these investigations and use this information to inform the committee’s oversight efforts in the future.

“Like most Americans, I have concerns about the inability of veterans in various locations across the country to access care in a reasonable period of time. I won’t go through all of the date; but the bottom line is that the reports worked on by the IG tells us that tens and tens of thousands of veterans were unable to get the care they needed in a timely manner. And what I hope we will learn today, from our new secretary, Mr. McDonald, and the ideas of the Inspector General, Mr. Griffith, is in fact how that problem developed. I don’t believe anyone joins the VA in order to manipulate data. How did it happen? What were the causes? How do make sure that this never happens again? What do we do with, and how quickly do we get rid of dishonorable employees? We gave the new secretary tools; we’ll want to find out how he is utilizing those tools. Maybe most importantly we want to learn how we go forward into the future to make sure these problems never occur again.

“I noticed in the paper yesterday that the secretary held a press conference talking about –  and I want to discuss it with him – his need to aggressively go out and bring new physicians, new nurses new medical personnel into the VA so we don’t have these wait times again. During this hearing I look forward also to talking with our new secretary about how he’s going to implement the legislation that was recently passed. So, there’s a lot to go over in this hearing. We thank the Secretary for being with us; we thank the Inspector General for being with us as well.