U.S. Rep. Tim Walz has sent a letter to the Veterans Affairs inspector general asking for a full investigation into allegations from two former Minneapolis VA employees that they were ordered to falsify records and maintain a separate secret waiting list for scheduling.
The employees worked in the Minneapolis hospital's gastroenterology department and say veterans waiting for such procedures as cancer screening colonoscopies often were put on long waiting lists or had appointments unexpectedly canceled.
Walz called the allegations from the employees, first reported by KARE-TV, "extremely troubling and run counter to what local leadership at the VA told me."
Walz, D-Minn., who sits on the House Veterans Affairs Committee, has repeatedly asked the Minneapolis VA about their scheduling practices after a national scandal about long wait times and secret scheduling lists, but has been assured there have been no problems locally.
But the Minneapolis hospital and a community-based clinic in Rochester have both been flagged for further review after a nationwide audit of VA facilities earlier this summer.
"If these allegations prove true, those responsible must and will be held accountable." Walz said in a statement.
The former employees came forward to the television station to say they were pressured to falsify patient appointment dates and medical records to hide delays.
In some cases, they told the station, employees were instructed to falsify medical records by writing that patients had declined follow-up treatments even though the veterans had never been contacted.
