Senate Committee: Indian Health Service hired cons, let workers steal drugs, excessive time off

The Associated Press: "The federal Indian Health Service has hired convicted criminals, failed to stop employees from stealing narcotics and allowed workers to take paid leave for more than a year while being investigated for misconduct, a federal investigation has found. The investigation disclosed years of mismanagement that have led to poor patient care, long-term vacancies and other problems at the Aberdeen Area of the Indian Health Service, which includes North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Nebraska."

The investigation was led by the Senate Indian Affairs Committee, which expects to release a final report by the end of the year. Sen. Byron Dorgan, the chairman, said the Aberdeen office "appears to me to be completely dysfunctional" (Daly, 9/28).

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This article was reprinted from khn.org with permission from the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation. Kaiser Health News, an editorially independent news service, is a program of the Kaiser Family Foundation, a nonpartisan health care policy research organization unaffiliated with Kaiser Permanente.