Veterans’ records found in home of dead VA clerk
The Department of Veterans’ Affairs have notified 15 veterans that their records were found in the home of a deceased VA employee in Dayton, Ohio, according to the Dayton Daily News. Of course, the department claims that it doesn’t know why that the hundreds of pages were in the home of the recently passed clerk in early May. The veterans were only notified this last week;
In his June 22 letter to Arnold, Glenn A. Costie, director of the Dayton VA Medical Center, said: “I was recently notified that VA medical records were found in the former residence of a deceased staff person. Records pertaining to you were among those found.”
The letter did not identify the deceased staffer or describe the person’s job responsibilities.
The letter informed Arnold that he could file a complaint with the VA to assert that his privacy rights had been violated. Costie also suggested that Arnold could take steps to protect himself against identity theft.
“VA takes our obligation to honor and serve America’s veterans very seriously,” Costie wrote. “We believe it is important for you to be fully informed of any potential risk to you, and apologize for any inconvenience or concern this situation may cause.”
Yeah, the VA takes their obligation seriously, so seriously they lose records and computers with Personally Identifiable Information (PII) on an almost monthly basis.
I don’t use the VA, but they have my PII, so I have to subscribe to Lifelock at my own expense to combat their incompetence. On top of that, it takes weeks if not months to contact victims of missing information…time enough for criminals to take advantage of it before you even know your stuff is stolen.
Category: Veterans' Affairs Department
Having had my own PII Compromised by VA Employees 3 times since 1995, I can certainly understand the anger.
As an employee, who handles not only PII but fellow veterans health information on a daily basis I try like hell to make sure I do my part to make sure it goes nowhere it does not belong.
I can tell horror stories of lost and missing records, employees who just left records to collect dust in their offices not discovered until years after they had left. Or the still employed “clerk” who argues with veterans because she says they don’t even know their own names because she just handed them the wrong records because she typed in the wrong social. Or how she sent a years worth of an inpatients records to an attorney’s office by mistake… twice. Or handed a set of records to another attorney without even verifying who he was, thinking it was a vet coming in to get his.
I can go on and on, and on….
This is like those stories about garbage bags full of undelivered mail found in various mail carriers’ homes after they died. And my personal favorite is a past IL Secretary of State who died in office, and who had stuffed shoeboxes full of uncashed checks for driver’s licenses and auto license fees and kept them hidden in a closet.
Like those, but worse.
I started a couple of months ago for the VHA. My first introduction to the wonderful disorganized world of the VA is when I stepped into my office on the first day and saw piles and piles of files, patient records, applications lying all over the office. Some dating back from three years ago. I spent my first month, all day, everyday filing. Months later, I am still finding files and records shoved away in odd places. And this is only a small department of about 6 employees (thankfully, fully staffed with Vets, but it wasn’t like that before). I would hate to think of what understaffed claims departments looks like.
and Jonn, I don’t blame you for not wanting to go to the VA. Why would you want to go to a place where you are constantly getting an attitude and yelled at.
All positions in the VA need to be staffed by vets. Start with the Rep and paper pusher positions, then work your way from there. You can change the efficiency just by changing the personnel- hire more vets in key areas that are always understaffed (claims, pensions, reps, etc.) Not much you can do about being hamstrung by Congress, though.
My experience with the VA was rocky until I went to James Lovell FHCC, which is now combined with the Hospital Corpsman School at Great Lakes Naval Station. Much better, very organized, plenty of people who are willing to help you out, no attitudes, and very visible signage everywhere, including one at the desk where you sign up for flu shots that says you can substitute VA prescription benefits for Part D of Medicare.
And it would be REALLY NICE if the VA could or would do that with ALL VA facilities. I say this because I don’t know what it’s like down at Hines VA on the south side of Chicago.
I suspect is has something to do with the type of person who gets into a job like that. In so many cases, but not all, these types of people don’t give a shit and hate their jobs. Company clerks in the Army who were only clerks and didn’t change from a combat arms MOS for example- didn’t give a shit. Company clerks who’d been grunts in the past, would bust their ass to help a Joe.
We had a useless female clerk in Bosnia. She was afraid to go outside the wire…she was lazy and didn’t give a shit. She went home early…and they found a bunch of mail and records stashed in her office.
At the end of her work day, she’s just throw shit in a file and forget about it.
Then I could go on for hours about the VA education folks and the VA medical folks…
The VA is probably the perfect example of what is wrong with the government. I’ve experienced both the good and the bad – mostly bad – with the VA on both medical and educational benefits. Too often it’s the “I really don’t care” or the “your a new vet, you must have PTSD” attitude that the VA personnel I’ve dealt with have that pisses me off.
Personally, I think that there should be a top to bottom housecleaning at the VA – employees that are competent and working with vets get to stay, the others get a pink slip. Go back and hire veterans for the newly vacant positions (especially those with medical and administrative backgrounds), and hire management that will look at the VA as a real business (placing the customer – the vet – first). Make them contract workers – they get to stay if they perform, gone if they don’t.
I would love to have a job at the VA in records or some other admin function…or any function. I would give 100% of myself every day and NEVER pull some shit like this.
Too bad the VA in my area hires dillweed’s like the kid who got hurt in bootcamp and discharged and thinks he’s a Marine and tells bootcamp stories while drawing your blood.
It really shatters your rose colored glasses when you work in the VA and you want everyone to share the same passion and dedication you have, and you realize, most are there for the paycheck and a pension. Vet hasn’t gotten his glasses: blow him off. Vet has questions about the process of getting a wheelchair: never call him back. Honestly, we at the VA do a horrible horrible job with keeping the Vet informed. There is a reason why the calls I get, the immediate reaction of the vet is to come out both guns blazing and be very combative, and it has nothing to do with PTSD or any crap like that, and everything to do with the way they have been treated by people who are supposedly working for them and have their back. I would do the same thing if I walked into a hospital and all I got was an attitude, incompetence, and the feeling I was inconveniencing people.
And this isn’t even touching on the outside vendors you have to deal with who only delay the process even more. It’s a mess and we need to clean house. The last thing we need is to have our OEF and OIF vets losing faith in an institution (supposedly) designed to help them. Unfortunately, I believe they already are beginning to lose that faith.
Zedechek, have you been to a hospital lately? The one nearest me (not connected to the VA) has a big billboard sign on the highway showing ER waiting times — shortest so far is 28 minutes, so if you come in gushing blood from an artery severed in an auto accident, good luck with that — you can bleed out from it before they’ll even talk to you.
I found this link at vetlawyers.com, regarding the VA’s attempts to improve responding to veterans’ requests:
http://vetlawyers.com/vetblog/index.php/2012/04/va-hopes-technology-modernization-will-speed-up-claims-process/
This has an April 2012 date, so it’s recent. Vetlawyers.com seems to be addressing veterans’ issues. Take a look.
Thanks.
The so-called “technology [COMPUTER] modernization” FRAUD —
has continued, BY GOV’T, at least since the 1990’s.
I do NOT apologize for pointing out THE TRUTH — and
I say, that in many cases, the FALSE PROMISES of “high-tech up-grade” is just that —
empty talk (sure, they’ll spend $$ MILLIONS of YOUR MONEY).
Okay, once in a while they may improve a little something —
thus, IT’S ALL DR BRETT’S FAULT FOR HURTING THEIR FEELINGS.
(*sarcasm* = the final clause of the last sentence)
@10,
Ex PH2, those signs are directed at the non emergent cases. They are aimed at getting the people who use the ED as a primary care physician versus waiting for a doctors visit. I used to work a triage position in a big trauma center, and it’s quite comical how pissed off people get when they are bypassed by someone sicker than they are.
Sample conversation in triage, usually 1:15am on a weeknight:
“Look, why did you let that guy in? I’ve been here for 2 hours!! I want to talk to your manager!!”
“Sir, that guy is having crushing chest pain/his lips are turning blue/piece of rebar sticking out of his neck, He gets priority treatment due to his illness.”
“Oh, so that’s how it’s gonna be is it? How about I call 911! Then I’ll get seen for my toe that’s been hurting me for a week and a half/discoloration on my thigh/ran out of my viagra prescription/cold medicine makes me itch, how about that???”
“Sir, we’ll see you based off of severity of injury, the ambulance is just going to get you a place to wait in the back. If you would like have a seat, we’ll get to you as soon as we can.
“Well, that’s the last time I come here! I’ll just go to my doctor next time!”
No joke, I’ve had probably thousands of variants of this conversation over the years. It actually can be quite entertaining. What cures these people is something dramatic, like a gang shooting victim stumbling in and collapsing in a pool of blood, or an old guy barfing and then arresting in the middle of the waiting room, or a panicky family bringing in a dead baby. The ‘gripers tend to sit down quietly after that.’
That was me above. 🙂
Just trying to put a positive spin on things, that’s all.
Any bureaucracy has three speeds: ahead slow, all ahead slow, and stop. I’ve seen some improvements since 1974, but until they stop hiring sandcrabs and put vets in their place, it’s going to be a long haul. We must be patienter.