Donovan Slack

USA TODAY

WASHINGTON — The Department of Veterans Affairs launched an investigation last month of poor patient care at the Oklahoma City VA Medical Center, but a top deputy in the office in charge of the probe may have a conflict of interest — his younger brother is the medical center’s chief of staff.

Dr. Edward Huycke, deputy of national assessments at the VA Office of the Medical Inspector in Washington, is the older brother of chief of staff Dr. Mark Huycke, who is accused of overseeing the failed care and ignoring earlier reports about it.

The VA launched the probe after a USA TODAY investigation found at least five veterans suffering from life-altering consequences of failures in care at the facility, including terminal cancer, bone decay and other painful conditions. A doctor said she reported the cases to Mark Huycke last spring.

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The VA has declined to respond to questions about what Mark Huycke knew and when, and said in a statement Thursday that his older brother recused himself from the investigation.

“The team lead for the Oklahoma City VA Medical Center investigation does not answer to, report to or coordinate with (Edward Huycke),” said the statement issued by VA spokeswoman Walinda West. She added that he and others on the team are in a different division.

But House VA Committee Chairman Jeff Miller, R-Fla., believes the entire office should have been recused because those employees, whatever their position, are essentially investigating care overseen by the brother of a high-ranking official in their office. The VA Office of Medical Inspector bills itself as an “objective and independent” office responsible for investigating health care provided by the agency.

Miller sent a letter to Secretary Bob McDonald Wednesday asking about potential family ties and demanding answers to a litany of other problems raised in USA TODAY’s investigation.

He wants to know why the Oklahoma City VA has cycled through five directors in three years and what is being done to improve patient safety at the facility, which has continuously ranked among the worst in the country in recent years.

He also asked why the facility is forcing veterans like George Washington Purifoy to drive six hours for treatment to a VA facility in Louisiana, an apparent violation of the Choice Act. Congress last year passed the law requiring the VA to allow veterans to get care in the private sector if their local VA could not meet their needs.

“Please explain why Purifoy was not offered non-VA care at a closer location, and … please identify by name who has been disciplined for this failure,” Miller wrote.

As of Wednesday, Purifoy was still being forced to drive to Louisiana for treatment. The 65-year-old Vietnam veteran suffered radiation damage to the bone underneath his nose in 2013, but VA medical professionals misdiagnosed it as a tooth ailment and sent him for root canals and other procedures.

Now, he has no nose, no front teeth and is in debilitating pain. He needs surgery to repair his bone and surrounding tissue and hopes to get a prosthetic nose. At the VA in Shreveport., La, Thursday, Purifoy said, providers told him the VA has now authorized funding for him to be seen closer to his home. By a provider in Dallas.

“At least the drive time is about 45 minutes less,” he said.

Meeting minutes obtained by USA TODAY provide a possible clue why officials at the Oklahoma City VA may be reticent to send him and others to get treatment locally in the private sector. Mark Huycke, the facility’s chief of staff, warned department heads at the Dec. 21 meeting that sending veterans outside the VA has “potential long-term ramifications.”

“Specifically, if the patient does not get his/her treatment within the VAMC the hospital will lose potential funding,” Huycke told attendees, according to the minutes.

In the statement Thursday, VA officials said he told attendees that providing care at the VA facility should be a “priority” over sending them to the private sector, which the center does “when it is deemed necessary and appropriate.”

“We believe the interpretation of the minutes may have been misunderstood,” the statement said.

The agency said the investigation of patient care at the facility is ongoing and that, in the meantime, the VA is “actively working with each of these veterans and their caregivers to ensure their medical needs are met.”

Mark Huycke has personally apologized to some of the veterans profiled by USA TODAY. He met with Charles Hand, a 90-year-old World War II veteran who had a cancerous tumor on his jaw that was visible on a scan in 2014 but went undetected and undiagnosed for nine months. By that time, the cancer had spread to his liver and lungs.

“He was admitting how the VA had really messed up,” Hand’s son Mike recalled about the meeting with Huycke on Dec. 23. “’We’re sorry, we made a mistake.’”

Charles Hand was admitted to the hospice wing of the Oklahoma City VA on Monday.

Mark Huycke also apologized to another patient who received poor care, visiting 70-year-old Vietnam veteran Stanley Christian Thursday. Christian has endured months of delays and at least one failed surgery to repair a hole between his mouth and sinus that leaves him vulnerable to an infection that could spread to his brain.

Christian said Huycke told him the VA now is prepared to send him for private sector care.

“I said, ‘You could have done that a long time ago,’” Christian recalled after the meeting. “He said, ‘Well, you know, communication was very bad and things just got out of hand.'”