Although the VA’s problems with recruiting and retaining employees in certain occupations are well documented, the department still does not have a complete plan in place to address that challenge, and IG report has said.
While the Veterans Health Administration “has made progress in developing and implementing staffing models, we did not identify a plan that included a set of milestones and timelines for further staffing model development to achieve full implementation,” it said.
The review, required by a 2014 law, focused on facility rankings of critical occupations, to interpret the largest staffing shortages and assess VA’s progress.
The top critical needs occupations are medical officer, nurse, psychologist, physician assistant, physical therapist and medical technologist, and in those occupations “a significant percentage of the total gains continues to be offset by staff losses,” it said.
Among nurses, for example, more than 8,500 were hired but nearly 5,000 were lost, for a net gain of only about 3,500; similarly, there was a net gain of fewer than 1,400 medical officers despite the hiring of nearly 3,500, and among medical technologists the hiring of 454 barely kept ahead of the 391 lost.
Retirements accounted for about a fifth to two-fifths of turnover in those occupations, but overall 60 percent of the losses were what the report termed “regrettable”–individuals who resign from the VA or who transfer to another government agency. “Regrettable losses are staff that potentially could have stayed on at VHA and represent a missed opportunity for VHA to retain staff,” it said.
The VA agreed with the report’s four recommendations, two of which were repeats from similar prior studies.
