Behind the walls of the nation's oldest veterans’ hospital, the reports were grim.
Medical experts from the Department of Veterans Affairs blamed one botched surgery after another on a lone podiatrist.
They
said Thomas Franchini drilled the wrong screw into the bone of one
veteran. He severed a critical tendon in another. He cut into patients
who didn’t need surgeries at all. Twice, he failed to properly fuse the
ankle of a woman, who chose to have her leg amputated rather than endure
the pain.
In 88 cases, the VA concluded, Franchini made mistakes that harmed veterans at the Togus hospital in Maine. The findings reached the highest levels of the agency.
"We
found that he was a dangerous surgeon," former hospital surgery chief
Robert Sampson said during a deposition in an ongoing federal lawsuit
against the VA.
Agency officials didn’t fire Franchini or report him to a national database that tracks problem doctors.
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Like universities there are VA hospitals in which the employees simply don't care about the customer. When no one cares it is time for the institution to be closed down and let the customer attend an institution of their own choosing at the expense of the government. indyjonesouthere
ReplyDeleteThey should all be closed with the veterans going to their doctor of choice. The doctors will have to accept the price the government pays, much like they due in CHAMPVA, or provide services to none of them.
DeleteListening to the local news tonite, WLOS, there are 50,000
ReplyDeletejob openings at VA hospital which they are not going to fill.
Meanwhile, in Afghanistan in which our troops are deployed
to kill and steal, it is costing American tax payers 14 million
dollars/minute to be there.
The VA has some good employees and those who are worthless, much like the civil service. Similar to the age old adage "10% of fishermen catch 90% of the fish."
Delete