Judge awards $2.5 million in medical lawsuit against VA hospital

The AP (3/6, Billeaud) reports from Phoenix that US Magistrate Judge Michelle Burns on Monday “awarded $2.5 million to a military veteran who said that his now-terminal cancer would have been curable had the Veterans Administration hospital in Phoenix diagnosed it sooner.” Judge Burns “ruled a nurse practitioner who found abnormalities in Steven Harold Cooper’s prostate during an examination in late 2011 at the Carl T. Hayden VA Medical Center had breached the standard of care by failing to order more testing and refer him to a urologist.” The AP notes that Phoenix “was the epicenter of a scandal in which whistleblowers revealed that veterans on secret waiting lists faced scheduling delays of up to a year.”