Healthcare Inspection - Alleged Research Funding Irregularities at the Central Texas Veterans Health Care System Temple, Texas

This review addresses allegations of fiscal, managerial, and scientific wrongdoing in several facets of the operations of the Central Texas Veterans Health Care System’s (CTVHCS’s) Brain Imaging and Recovery Laboratory (BIRL); indifference on the part of CTVHCS’s senior management when alerted to these irregularities; and improper support for an investigator’s research by CTVHCS leadership in exchange for his assumption of certain administrative responsibilities. We partially substantiated the allegation of mismanagement of VA funds. For example, 8 hours per week of magnetic resonance imaging scanner time at a rate of $486.70 per hour was paid to the University of Texas at Austin without BIRL research to support expenditures of this magnitude; nor did the contract call for CTVHCS to pay for a set number of hours of scanner time per week. We also found that the CTVHCS Research and Development Committee did not appropriately review expenditures for a principal investigator’s project. And while we found that CTVHCS management took allegations seriously, allegations should have been addressed more formally and promptly. We did not find inappropriate, unethical, or illegal reciprocity in the appointment of an administrative position. Finally, a number of incidental findings are detailed in this report.