(SitNews) Washington, D.C. - Today, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) released the results from its Nationwide Access Audit, along with facility level patient access data, medical center quality and efficiency data, and mental health provider survey data, for all Veterans health facilities.

Full details made public at VA.gov follow Acting Secretary of Veterans Affairs Sloan Gibson’s commitment last week in Phoenix, Arizona and San Antonio, Texas to provide timely access to quality healthcare Veterans have earned and deserved.

“It is our duty and our privilege to provide Veterans the care they have earned through their service and sacrifice,” said Acting Secretary Gibson. “As the President has said, as Secretary Shinseki said, and as I stated plainly last week, we must work together to fix the unacceptable, systemic problems in accessing VA healthcare.

“Today, we’re providing the details to offer transparency into the scale of our challenges, and of our system itself. I’ll repeat – this data shows the extent of the systemic problems we face, problems that demand immediate actions. As of today, VA has contacted 50,000 Veterans across the country to get them off of wait lists and into clinics. Veterans deserve to have full faith in their VA, and they will keep hearing from us until all our Veterans receive the care they’ve earned.”

In a prepared statement, U.S. Senator Mark Begich (D-AK) said of the May 15, 2014 audit & wait times of the Anchorage facility, “I’m reading this report closely but am pleased it shows the VA health care system in Alaska does not have the same significant problems that other states are experiencing. In addition to having fewer veterans on our wait lists, wait times for Alaskan veterans for services are far less than in other states and, in the case of mental health issues, the AK VA essentially achieves same-day-service with immediate assessments. It has taken a lot of hard work and tearing down some bureaucratic hurdles along the way, but we owe it to our veterans to provide proper access to the services and care they have earned – and that is what I have been fighting for since day one in the Senate. While there is still work to do, today’s numbers reflect great improvement in the performance of the AK VA in recent years and point to Alaska as a model for successful programs that can be implemented in other states.” Alaska results of the Department of Veterans Affairs audit (pdf fact sheet).

Also in a prepared statement, U.S. Senator Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) today responded to the Alaska results of the Department of Veterans Affairs audit (pdf fact sheet): “The Anchorage findings from the VA’s nationwide audit are encouraging, but it’s important to note these figures only represent a single, momentary snapshot that reflects a number of proactive moves made by the Anchorage outpatient clinic to reduce a backlog that reportedly reached 900 late last year."

Further Murkowski stated, “I am proud that the Anchorage VA leads the system in partnerships with community providers – a strategy I’ve been prodding the VA to adopt since 2006. Not only must we maintain these positive response times, we must make sure that our day-in, day-out commitment to those who served is achieved and sustained across our state at both major facilities and the community based outpatient clinics.”

The VA's Hospital Compare website reports very little data available for Alaska VA facilities through 2013. Information reporting medical center quality, efficiency (SAIL) and mental health data for Alaska and all states can be accessed at http://www.hospitalcompare.va.gov/. This website allows veterans and their families to compare how well their local VA hospital cares for its veterans with congestive heart failure, heart attack, pneumonia, and summarizes outcomes in areas such as acute care, safety, Intensive Care and other health measures.

Acting Secretary Gibson announced a series of additional actions in response to today’s national audit findings and data, including:

• Establishing New Patient Satisfaction Measurement Program- Acting Secretary Gibson has directed VHA to immediately begin developing a new patient satisfaction measurement program to provide real-time, robust, location-by-location information on patient satisfaction, to include satisfaction data of those Veterans attempting to access VA healthcare for the first time. This program will be developed with input from Veterans Service Organizations, outside health care organizations, and other entities. This will ensure VA collects an additional set of data – directly from the Veteran’s perspective – to understand how VA is doing throughout the system.
• Holding Senior Leaders Accountable- Where audited sites identify concerns within the parent facility or its affiliated clinics, VA will trigger administrative procedures to ascertain the appropriate follow-on personnel actions for specific individuals.
• Ordering an Immediate VHA Central Office and VISN Office Hiring Freeze- Acting Secretary Gibson has ordered an immediate hiring freeze at the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) central office in Washington D.C. and the 21 VHA Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) regional offices, except for critical positions to be approved by the Secretary on a case-by-case basis. This action will begin to remove bureaucratic obstacles and establish responsive, forward leaning leadership.
• Removing 14-Day Scheduling Goal VA is eliminating the 14-day scheduling goal from employee performance contracts- This action will eliminate incentives to engage in inappropriate scheduling practices or behaviors.
• Increasing Transparency by Posting Data Twice-Monthly- At the direction of the Acting Secretary, VHA will post regular updates to the access data released today at the middle and end of each month at VA.gov. Twice-monthly data updates will enhance transparency and provide the most immediate information to Veterans and the public on Veterans access to quality healthcare.
• Initiating an Independent, External Audit of Scheduling Practices- Acting Secretary Gibson has also directed that an independent, external audit of system-wide VHA scheduling practices be performed.
• Sending Additional Frontline Team to Address Phoenix- Following his trip to Phoenix VA Medical Center last week, Acting Secretary Gibson directed a VHA frontline team to travel to Phoenix to immediately address scheduling, access, and resource requirements needed to provide Veterans the timely, quality healthcare they deserve.
• Utilizing High Performing Facilities to Help Those That Need Improvement- VA will formalize a process in which high performing facilities provide direct assistance and share best practices with facilities that require improvement on particular medical center quality and efficiency, also known as SAIL, performance measures.
• Applying Immediate Access Reforms Announced in Phoenix to Most Challenged VA Facilities- Last week, Acting Secretary Gibson announced a series of measures to address healthcare access problems in Phoenix. Today, Acting Secretary Gibson announced he’ll apply the same reforms to facilities with the most access problems from the results of the audit, including:
• Hiring Additional Clinical and Patient Support Staff- VA will deploy teams of dedicated human resource employees to accelerate the hiring of additional, needed staff.
• Employing New Staffing Measures- VA’s first goal is to get Veterans off wait lists and into clinics. VA is using temporary staffing measures, along with clinical and administrative support, to ensure these Veterans receive the care they have earned through their service.
• Deploying Mobile Medical Units- VA will send mobile medical units to facilities to immediately provide services to patients and Veterans awaiting care.
• Providing More Care by Modifying Local Contract Operations- VA will modify local contract operations to be able to offer more community-based care to Veterans waiting to be seen by a doctor.
• Removing Senior Leadership- Where appropriate, VA will initiate the process of removing senior leaders. Acting Secretary Gibson is committed to using all authority at VA’s disposal to enforce accountability among senior leaders.
  Suspending Performance Awards- VA has suspended all VHA senior executive performance awards for FY2014.
• Future Travel Over the course of the next several weeks- Acting Secretary Gibson will travel to a series of VA facilities across the country. He will hear directly from Veterans and employees about obstacles to providing timely, quality care and how VA can immediately address them.

Edited by Mary Kauffman, SitNews

On the Web:

VA Access Audit - Department of Veterans Affairs Access Audit System-Wide Review of Access -- Results of Access Audit Conducted May 12, 2014, through June 3, 2014
National audit and patient access data
http://www.va.gov/health/access-audit.asp

Medical center quality and efficiency (SAIL) and mental health data - Search by each state
http://www.hospitalcompare.va.gov/

Source of News: 

Department of Veterans Affairs (VA)
www.va.gov

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Ketchikan, Alaska

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