Federal Reports

OIG conducted a healthcare inspection in response to requests from Senator Cory Booker, Senator Robert Menendez, and Congressman Frank LoBiondo to assess concerns that a patient’s insufficient access to timely mental health (MH) care may have contributed to the patient’s suicide and that general access to MH care was limited at the Atlantic County Community Based Outpatient Clinic (CBOC), Northfield, NJ. The patient at the center of this review received routine MH care at the CBOC for several years through the fall of 2014. The patient requested a MH appointment in late 2015, which was scheduled for 3 months later. In the interim, the patient experienced severe family and vocational stressors and ultimately completed suicide before the date of his scheduled MH appointment. The patient had not been seen by his MH providers for 11 months prior to his death. We identified failures to provide the patient a timely appointment and that instructions for overbooking were either not followed or not communicated. We found the staff failed to follow up on clinic cancellations, patient no-shows, and appointments for approved care in the community, leaving the patient without follow-up appointments and refills for prescribed medications. We found the clinical staff failed to acknowledge and document the lack of appointments and failed to reach out to re-engage the patient in therapy. In addition, staff failed to make appointments for authorized care in the community. In general, the facility did not provide appropriate supervision and oversight of clinic processes for walk-in patients, patient no-shows, clinic cancellations, non-VA care coordination consults, and patient termination.

This Risk Advisory is to report our concerns regarding control weaknesses within the MyPBAweb application. The suggestions contained in this Risk Advisory do not constitute formal auditrecommendations.

Statement of John Roth, Inspector General Department of Homeland Security, before the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform U.S. House of Representatives concerning, “Recommendations and Reforms from the Inspectors General"

The Office of Inspector General issued the audit of the financial statements of the Single-Employer and Multiemployer Program Funds administered by the Pension Benefit Guaranty Corporation (PBGC) as of and for the years ended September 30, 2017 and 2016 finding:1. The financial statements were presented fairly, in all material respects, in conformity with accounting principles generally accepted in the United States of America. This is the 25th consecutive unmodified financial statement audit opinion.2. PBGC maintained, in all material respects, effective internal control over financial reporting as of September 30, 2017. Specifically:(a) Serious internal control weaknesses in PBGC’s programs and operations include three significant deficiencies: (i) Controls over the Present Value of Future Benefit (PVFB) Liability, (ii) Present Value of Nonrecoverable Future Financial Assistance (PV NFFA), and (iii) Access Controls and Configuration Management).(b) PBGC strengthened its control environment by implementing management practices to mitigate control deficiencies reported in previous years. Further, management improved its current business processes to address specific financial reporting and information technology control deficiencies.3. Instances of noncompliance or other matters that are required to be reported in accordance with Government Auditing Standards.(a) Potential Antideficiency Violation: PBGC maintains operating leases for all office site locations and its COOP site. However, PBGC did not record its full contractual obligation under all of the multiyear lease arrangements. We reported this as a potential violation in our FY 2016 Independent Auditor’s Report. In FY 2017, PBGC general counsel reported the violation to the Office of Management and Budget and is currently awaiting a decision.