Rep. Schrier Pushes VA for Answers on Failed Electronic Health System Rollout in Eastern Washington
WASHINGTON, DC – Today Congresswoman Kim Schrier, M.D. (WA-08) again joined the House Veterans Affairs Committee for a hearing on the Electronic Health Record (EHR) system rollout at Mann-Grandstaff VA Medical Center, which has affected the Community-Based Outpatient Clinic (CBOC) in Wenatchee. Last year the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) began the deployment of the Cerner EHR in Spokane. Several Office of Inspector General (OIG) reports have since come out that show major flaws in the rollout that have led to patient harm. Rep. Schrier’s remarks in Committee can be found here and here.
“I am deeply concerned about these rollouts. Physicians are putting in orders for patients to get another level of care, whether that is more testing or seeing a specialist or something else. For reasons that aren’t entirely clear, some orders are being sent to an ‘unknown queue’ without notifying the doctor or patient, so the order just sits in the queue. Most recently, an OIG report found almost 150 cases of harm- including two cases of severe harm- due to orders for everything from labs and x-rays to follow up appointments, lost in EHR queues that weren’t being checked. And, upon inspection, over 11,000 orders in less than a year from physicians were NOT acted on in a timely manner,” said Rep. Schrier. “11,000 orders is a lot of orders. I am a physician and a patient, so I’ve been on both ends of ‘orders.’ It is alarming that so many weren’t completed, and as a result patients were harmed.”
In her remarks, Rep. Schrier asked doctors from the VA what kinds of harm they are currently seeing as a result of missed orders and whether these types of issues existed with the previous system, Vista. The VA didn’t directly answer Rep. Schrier’s questions or provide specific examples.
Rep. Schrier also had the opportunity to ask questions of Oracle, the company now in charge of deploying the EHR system. As a doctor, Rep. Schrier has used other Cerner systems. Oracle told Rep. Schrier that they will be making improvements next week that should eliminate the “unknown queue” problem and are on the ground at VA facilities right now to train employees and give feedback in real time.
Rep. Schrier concluded by asking for more support for providers and patients: “Can you make sure this training for employees happens at the CBOC in Wenatchee? Because they need that same ‘elbow to elbow’ help to make sure that their patients, my constituents, get the absolute best care.”
This isn’t Rep. Schrier’s first action on this issue. Last year she questioned the Deputy VA Secretary Donald Remy about issues Veterans in the 8th District were already experiencing with the Cerner EHR rollout and the phone system at the Wenatchee CBOC. At the time, Rep. Schrier also raised these concerns to VA Secretary Denis McDonough and sent a letter to the VA outlining what she was hearing from 8th District Veterans. A damning OIG report that was leaked in May confirmed many of Rep. Schrier’s concerns that she outlined in the letter.