Colorado legislators demand answers from Aurora VA about patient safety, halt in surgeries due to mysterious residue

Colorado’s senators and a congressman are demanding answers from U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs leadership over a series of troubling reports about its Aurora hospital.

Sens. Michael Bennet and John Hickenlooper, both Democrats, and Rep. Jason Crow, an Aurora Democrat, sent a letter to VA leadership on Monday requesting an accounting of patient safety issues, further explanation over its current pause in surgeries due to a mysterious residue on its medical equipment, and steps the hospital has taken to address pervasive cultural problems among its staff.

“As problems persist within the (Eastern Colorado hospital system), we are increasingly concerned about the quality of care Colorado veterans receive, a lack of adherence to the required medical and employee procedures, and how recent leadership changes have impeded the system’s effectiveness,” the lawmakers wrote.

The letter comes on the heels of two scathing reports from the VA’s Office of Inspector General, which investigates departmental waste, fraud and abuse.

The probes, released June 24, found Aurora’s Rocky Mountain Regional VA Medical Center paused surgeries for more than a year in 2022 and 2023 because the hospital didn’t have the staff to care for those patients after their procedures. They never told the federal VA as required, the investigation found.

The second inspector general report said the Aurora VA suffered from poor organizational health, citing widespread fear among staff that promoted disenfranchisement. Doctors stopped performing high-risk procedures, one staffer said, for fear of punishment if something went wrong.

The investigation mirrored The Denver Post’s reporting since last fall, which found the toxic workplace and culture of fear had permeated a wide swath of departments, leading to high turnover, especially among senior leadership positions. The Post also found that the head of the hospital’s prosthetics department was instructing employees to cancel veterans’ orders to clear a large backlog. The VA later confirmed The Post’s reporting.

Bennet, Hickenlooper and Crow, in their letter, asked the VA to respond to a series of questions, including detailed queries about the mysterious residue that has halted hundreds of surgeries since April. The Post first reported in May that the hospital was rescheduling or referring to community hospitals all surgeries that rely on reusable equipment.

The elected officials also asked the VA about staffing shortages at the hospital network, along with reports that many veterans in the system have been waiting months for their first face-to-face appointment with a provider.

“We share the goal of providing veterans across the country with timely, quality and consistent health care,” the letter states. “The continuous appointment delays and ongoing quality issues at (the hospital) undermine this objective.”

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