Delaware Commissioner Proposes VA Bill

New legislation proposed by Insurance Commissioner Matt Denn is designed to allow Delaware veterans to stay in Delaware’s VA hospital for some surgeries rather than being sent to VA facilities out of state.

Senate Bill 269, sponsored by Sen. George Howard Bunting, Sen. Patricia Blevins, Rep. Terry Spence and Rep. John Kowalko, would address a shortage of surgeons that currently exists at the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Elsmere, which is resulting in Delaware veterans being referred to Maryland and Pennsylvania VA facilities for some surgical procedures.

“There are a number of retired surgeons that have offered to do work at the VA hospital, but there is a clause in the medical malpractice insurance contracts of retired doctors that causes them to lose their coverage for past acts of medical malpractice if they come out of retirement to work as surgeons at the VA hospital,” Denn said. “This bill would eliminate that insurance barrier and allowed retired surgeons to provide critically needed surgical services to Delaware veterans.”

The insurance barrier addressed by the legislation is a clause in the medical malpractice insurance contracts of retired doctors that causes them to lose their “tail coverage” for past acts of medical malpractice if they come out of retirement to work as surgeons at the VA hospital. The bill only addresses doctors working at the VA hospital.

“This legislation is going to help us a lot – help us to recruit the doctors we need to treat veterans, help us reduce waiting time for critical procedures, and help us reduce the number of referrals we have to make outside of Delaware,” said Dr. Dennis Witmer, who is head of surgery at the Elsmere VA hospital and initially alerted Commissioner Denn to the issue. “Currently, we even have some veterans who will choose not to get a procedure because of the travel time to another hospital and that’s not a good thing.”

According to Witmer, more than 1,200 major surgeries a year are performed at the Elsmere VA hospital, a number he said that could increase “significantly” with the passage of SB 269 and the recruitment of more surgeons.