Opening Statement to Committee:

Chairman Mitchell and Members of the Committee I would like to thank you for the opportunity to come to you today as a citizen who’s been involved with not just the medical industry here and abroad but as an elected official in Montgomery County Texas.

I have been fortunate enough to travel extensively throughout South America, Europe and here in the states in the health care arena. I have witnessed first hand differences between government facilities and those in the private sector and can state without question the improvements I’ve seen in our VA facilities; a perfect example is the Michael E. DeBakey VA Medical Center in Houston, Texas, prior to this health care system being built, in my opinion, our facilities were old and less then adequate for the veterans in our area.

Before going into my testimony I would like to give this Committee a brief background of myself, for you to have a better understanding of why I feel privileged to be able to speak to future needs of our veterans and to offer a fresh pair of eyes to the emergency preparedness and planning within the VA department going forward.

I mentioned earlier that I am an elected official in Montgomery County, Texas. I am a board member of the Montgomery County Hospital District and have been since 2006. I am currently serving as vice chair of this board for my third consecutive year and in addition chair our legislative Committee.

The Montgomery County Hospital District is the sole provider of emergency ambulance service for Montgomery County, Texas.  Serving a rapidly growing population of 460,000, MCHD responds to 42,000 calls for service each year.

MCHD serves a pivotal role during disaster response.  The agency and its staff have taken a lead role in developing the tools to coordinate EMS mass response for coastal community evacuation and post landfall response.   MCHD’s dispatch center was the coordination point for the mass EMS response into East Texas following Hurricane Rita.   The lessons learned from that incident contributed greatly to the statewide success during Hurricane Ike—the largest EMS deployment in United States history.

MCHD coordinates Public Health Preparedness and Medical Branch operations in Montgomery County during large-scale operations, including the 2009 H1N1 pandemic.   Currently MCHD is coordinating a regional effort to develop EMS mass response to no-notice catastrophic situations as part of the Regional Catastrophic Planning Grant program.

Our hospital district CEO serves as the Chairman of the Southeast Texas Regional Advisory Council.  This organization is the grant recipient and administrative entity overseeing hospital preparedness using funding for the nine counties in the Houston region.

Mr. Chairman, Committee Members, my company has been involved with several start up organizations or corporations that are attempting to rise to another level. These companies have asked me to come in and assess current status, where they have been and set goals to achieve where they would like get. Through this process I have had clients who have benefited by programs that were well intended but lacked long range planning.

The reason I’m here today is that I believe that I can plant the seed for new ideas in the hope that this Committee and our Veterans Affairs Department can nurture these ideas to benefit our veterans.

Finally, I want to once again thank you for this opportunity to testify before this Committee. 

Testimony:

Mr. Chairman, Committee Members, in evaluating the request to speak to you today concerning emergency preparedness of the VA system along with my companies involvement in both private and public sector, I drew from our lessons learned in Montgomery County, Texas. Those lessons taught us that there are key topics necessary to address in preparation of such catastrophes. Those areas include Communications, Action and review of New Programs available.

Communications:

In our case (Gulf Coast) hurricane season repeats itself every year so that preparation becomes a fine-tuning issue versus starting from the unknown. In my review of the VA web site I found it easy to find information and locate facilities. This is a large part of the success we’ve had in Montgomery County with the abilities to communicate with our residence and it falls under the communications necessary to serve the people the VA is charged with caring for.

The need for our veterans to be able to communicate to the VA is essential and in scrolling through the web site there are several toll free numbers to do this, my question to this Committee and I do not know the answer is; Are we doing enough for them in communicating using other forms of contact?

In addition since every area of the country has known weather disasters (Fires, mudslides and earthquakes in the west, tornado’s in the mid section of our country, hurricanes and flooding in the southwest and north east, these include 8 zones of the 21 listed:  Questions 7, 8, 15, 16, 17, 19, 21 and 22), are there plans in place through the Veterans Administration that educate our veterans where to go and what to do to prepare?

Since the Veterans Administration has divided the country into 21 separate zones would it be beneficial for each zone with known potential catastrophic issues communicate to their constituency what to do and where to go if such an issue occurs?

Action:

Are our (VA) facilities prepared in case of a catastrophic event in each zone?

Example:

What we did after Rita was to identify what went wrong (and there was plenty) to determine how best to resolve that problem.

A few problems MCHD incurred during Rita that were addressed and solutions found:

1. Power outage

1. No fuel
2. No refrigeration
3. Not enough generators for those homebound

2. Evacuation of population

1. Freeways and city streets were at standstill
2. No electricity, no communications (i.e.: phones, television, radios, computers)

Again I believe advanced solutions can be found with our knowledge of weather related issues in geographic areas of the United States. 

New Programs:

Public:

Does the VA integrate new communication programs to benefit our veterans on an ongoing basis? Is it working with local officials for this communication?

Is there a method that rewards staff members when they create a program to better serve our veterans?

What is the mission of the VA and is it communicated with those who have to achieve it?

Private Sector:

There are always entrepreneurs, who can identify problems and create solutions, are we making opportunity available to them to introduce themselves and become a supplier to the VA? I was pleased to see the VA supported bill H.R. 114 in assisting our veterans who have been “inside the ropes,” understand the problems and have created solutions. Are we listening to them?

Currently my company has been involved with a program that was specifically geared for the benefit of the medical needs in Haiti. There medical needs include requiring operating rooms that are not under tents. The company I’m working with is owned by a veteran who developed and patented a mobile hospital that in fact has the highest medical standard (Joint Commission Inspected) we live by here in America. This is a private sector opportunity that could very well be integrated into the VA system. It’s cost effective and mobile in case of catastrophic events.

My question again is; if I have a company who’s created solutions to problems imagine how many other veteran owned companies or simply private entities are out there with solutions to problems.

No different from our current disaster in the gulf, when the private sector is given the opportunity to create solutions it will; my message to this Committee is to assure our veterans the best care possible and in order to do that we need to listen to the private sector and develop internal solutions through our public entities.

Finally I want to again express my gratitude for the opportunity to speak before this Committee today. It’s my hope that my testimony today will inspire thoughts for solutions.

I’ll be happy to answer any questions you have.