Michigan Lawmakers Seek Assurances Surgeries Are Safe At VA Hospital

ANN ARBOR (AP) - Two members of Michigan's congressional delegation have sought assurances from a Veterans Affairs hospital director that surgeries are being conducted safely.

U.S. Reps. Debbie Dingell and Tim Walberg said they sent a letter Friday to VA Ann Arbor Healthcare System Director Robert McDivitt after surgeries had been canceled or moved to another hospital. The Detroit Free Press reports those measures were taken by the VA facility because some surgical equipment cases might have contained small bits of sediment from an earlier water main break.

Dingell, a Dearborn Democrat, and Walberg, a Tipton Republican, wrote they received calls that surgeries resumed "despite the continued presence of particulate matter on surgical equipment."

Ann Arbor VA spokesman Derek Atkinson tells the Free Press there have been no issues since surgeries resumed and patient safety was never compromised. He adds that for a time equipment was sterilized elsewhere.