Dr Roy Marokus, who currently serves in private practice…said veterans’ appointments were cancelled so VA medical providers could attend the two-day conference. Medical providers at the VA Medical Center in Oklahoma City, where Marokus briefly worked, and providers at all other VA medical centers in the Veterans Integrated Services Network [VISN 16, which includes VA facilities in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Mississippi, Louisiana, and parts of Missouri , Texas, Alabama, and Florida], attended the conference.

A review of the paperwork handed out during the conference showed topics included advice on how to plan a party and asked the medical staff to explore, “What Color is Your Personality?”

“Veterans waiting for appointments got pushed back for two days,” Marokus said. “In human costs, you have all these veterans. Why was that conference needed?”

And this, in VISN 22, which includes parts of California and Nevada:

Another veteran took issue with the filming of the TV show Grey’s Anatomy, which takes place at the Sepulveda VA Ambulatory Care Center. The filming encompasses the entire second floor of the facility.

Gary B, who asked for his last name to be withheld due to a pending 1151 claim [such a claim is for death or disability “as if service-connected”—including VA medical malpractice] with the VA, said aside from the limited care for veterans, the show’s trailers are an inconvenience for veterans.

“They take up the whole parking lot,” he said.

And there is this incident:

A Veterans Affairs nurse who spent 28 years at the embattled agency’s facility in Albany, NY, says when she came forward to report abuse including stolen drugs [including 5,000 vials of morphine from a locked drawer(!); the vials were refilled with saline solution and replaced] and mistreatment of patients, her supervisors turned on her instead of trying to fix things.

The patient abuse and the VA’s response to her calling it out include this:

…she reported that doctors had restrained a patient for seven hours in violation of VA rules. Now she has been banished to an office cubicle, stripped of her nursing duties and supervisory role and faces a 30-day suspension without pay.