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 A veteran who collapsed in a cafeteria at Albuquerque’s Veterans Affairs hospital died after waiting 20 to 25 minutes to get to the same hospital’s emergency room, located about 500 yards away, a VA spokeswoman confirmed Thursday. An Albuquerque Fire Department spokeswoman said it took an ambulance about 11 minutes to be dispatched and arrive at the cafeteria, which is about a five-minute walk from the emergency room, officials at the hospital said. VA spokeswoman Sonja Brown said VA staff told her that at least 20 minutes elapsed between the man’s medical episode and when he arrived at the ER. Kirtland Air Force Medical Group personnel, who regularly eat lunch at the cafeteria, performed CPR until the ambulance arrived, Brown said. Staff followed VA policy that said personnel must call 911 for a medical emergency that happens outside the main hospital. “Our policy is under expedited review,” Brown said. Brown said the policy is a local one, and Jean Schaefer, spokeswoman for the Phoenix-based regional VA network, said these types of medical center policies vary across VA campuses, depending on what facilities are there. The man’s name hasn’t been released. News of the man’s death at the Raymond G. Murphy VA Medical Center spread Thursday among veterans who were visiting the center for various medical reasons. Lorenzo Calbert, 65, a U.S. Army veteran of the Vietnam War, said it was sad that a fellow veteran had to die so close to where he could have received help. “There’s no reason for it,” he said. Workers are required to call 911. They could have put him on the gurney and run faster than that ambulance.” 
 
 An Albuquerque Fire Department spokeswoman said law prohibits disclosing how long it took for the ambulance to get from the cafeteria to the hospital. The Albuquerque Fire Department said they dispatched a rescue unit at 12:26 p.m. That unit arrived at the hospital at 12:33 p.m. 
 
 
 
 Albuquerque ambulance said their paramedics got to the veteran at 12:39 p.m. 
 
 
 
 Nearly 14 minutes passed from the time he collapsed to the time medics arrived at the scene. However, Brown said that, if the ambulance company and AFD are correct about their response times, it would have taken at least 10 minutes for the veteran to be driven the 500 yards between the cafeteria to the hospital. The buildings include the main hospital in Building 41, but the cafeteria or canteen aren’t mentioned. “In any case, the inability of officials to answer basic questions in a timely fashion is yet another reason the public has lost faith, and why we are demanding an outside investigation and immediate reform at the Albuquerque VA.” 
 
 The death comes as the Department of Veterans Affairs remains under scrutiny for widespread reports of long delays for treatment and medical appointments and of veterans dying while on waiting lists. A review last week cited “significant and chronic system failures” in the nation’s health system for veterans. The review also portrayed the struggling agency as one battling a corrosive culture of distrust, lacking in resources and ill-prepared to deal with an influx of new and older veterans with a range of medical and mental health care needs. The scathing report by Deputy White House chief of staff Rob Nabors said the Veterans Health Administration, the VA sub agency that provides health care to about 8.8 million veterans a year, has systematically ignored warnings about its deficiencies and must be fundamentally restructured. Marc Landy, a political science professor at Boston College, said the Department of Veterans Affairs is a large bureaucracy with various local policies like the one under review in Albuquerque. Although the agency needs to undergo reform, Landy said it’s unfair to attack the VA too harshly on the recent Albuquerque death, because it appears to be so unusual. “I think we have to be careful,” he said. “Let’s not beat up too much on the VA while they are already facing criticism.”
– Another black eye for the Veterans Health Administration? A 71-year-old veteran died on Monday after waiting up to 30 minutes for an ambulance—while already at a Veteran Affairs hospital. Officials say the man collapsed in the Albuquerque hospital's cafeteria, which is around 1,500 feet from the emergency room, about a four-minute walk, the AP reports. By the time medics arrived, loaded him into the ambulance, and drove him around the building, it was too late to save him. A VA spokeswoman says staff followed policy by calling 911 when the man collapsed, but that "policy is under expedited review." The man's family has asked that he remain unidentified because they are considering legal action, KOAT reports. The case comes after a long series of reports of serious deficiencies at the VA, including dozens of veterans dying while on "secret waiting lists," the Albuquerque Journal reports. Rep. Michelle Grisham says her office has been trying for days to get the VA to answer "whether its policy may have contributed to the delay in care." In any case, she says, "the inability of officials to answer basic questions in a timely fashion is yet another reason the public has lost faith, and why we are demanding an outside investigation and immediate reform at the Albuquerque VA."