Senator asks federal prosecutors to scrutinize VA hospital

ST. LOUIS -- U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin has asked federal prosecutors to investigate a Department of Veterans Affairs hospital in Illinois where he says employees have made "deeply disturbing" claims of flawed patient care, shoddy oversight and possibly criminal behavior.

The Illinois Democrat's request came after his office got a letter from a group identifying itself as 31 past and present workers at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Marion, Ill.

The letter claims that a doctor who lost his license in another state is practicing at the hospital, several medical providers at the site have not had their credentials verified, nurses have been told to shred important documents, and records of patients who have died at the hospital have been erased from computers.

The hospital already has been under VA scrutiny and mounting, Durbin-led political pressure in the wake of revelations that 10 patients died under the care of surgeon Dr. Jose Veizaga-Mendez during his roughly 20 months at the hospital.

Veizaga-Mendez resigned in mid-August, three days after a Kentucky patient bled to death after a gallbladder surgery performed by Veizaga-Mendez. Shortly afterward, the hospital suspended inpatient operations.

A second surgeon, who hospital officials have declined to name, also is under investigation.

In his letter Saturday to the U.S. Attorney's Office covering Southern Illinois, Durbin insisted the allegations by the Marion VA workers to Durbin, five other senators and the VA "are extremely serious and deserve immediate investigation," especially "in light of the numerous alarming revelations about the Marion VAMC that have already come to light in recent weeks."