A senior VA hospital in Washington, D.C., has admitted a patient with terminal cancer who was not being treated at a traditional hospital.
Dr. Christopher Burrows, the hospital’s chief of internal medicine and vice president of patient safety, told the local ABC affiliate that he was told by his chief of surgery that he should be transferred to a hospital that has more experience with treating patients with advanced cancers.
The patient, who has not been identified, was transferred to Burrows because he is being treated by an outside doctor, Burrows said, and because Burrows felt that he could not take care of himself.
According to the VA, there are at least 10,000 veterans in the U-1 system who are diagnosed with terminal cancers, with some dying in the VA system before being transferred to the hospital.
The VA has said that about 2,000 of them are discharged from the hospital before they have had time to receive follow-up care at a hospital, according to the Washington Post.
Burrows said he has been notified of the patient’s death and his plan is to make a quick decision on the patient when he returns to his hospital office on Tuesday.
The facility has seen an increase in the number of cases of advanced cancer diagnosed by the VA in recent years, which have been blamed on the growing number of patients who go to the local hospital.
In September, the VA announced that it was closing all its U-2 facilities in the country, which included two in Virginia, because of the increased number of people coming from outside the U