Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representa-
tives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, 
SECTION 1. SHORT TITLE. 
This Act may be cited as the ‘‘VA Medical Center 
Recovery Act’’. 
SEC. 2. EVALUATION AND IMPROVEMENT OF MEDICAL 
CENTERS. 
(a) UNDERPERFORMING MEDICAL CENTERS.— 
(1) IN
GENERAL.—Chapter 73 of title 38, 
United States Code, is amended by inserting after 
section 7311A the following new section: 
‘‘§ 7311B. Evaluation and improvement of medical 
centers 
‘‘(a) IDENTIFICATION OF UNDERPERFORMING MED-
ICAL CENTERS.—(1) Not later than 15 days after the end 
of each fiscal quarter, the Secretary shall publish in the 
Federal Register and on a publically available, searchable 
Internet website of the Department a compilation of key 
health metrics for each medical center of the Department. 
‘‘(2) On a semiannual basis, the Secretary shall de-
termine, under the key health metrics, whether each med-
ical center of the Department is satisfactory or underper-
forming. 
‘‘(b) RAPID DEPLOYMENT TEAMS.—(1) Not later 
than 30 days after the date on which the Secretary identi-
fies a medical center as an underperforming medical cen-
ter under subsection (a)(2), the Secretary shall deploy a 
rapid deployment team to the medical center to ensure 
that the medical center achieves satisfactory performance 
as quickly as practicable. 
‘‘(2) Each rapid deployment team deployed to an 
underperforming medical center under paragraph (1) 
shall— 
‘‘(A) identify the areas of the medical center 
that require improvement, including with respect to 
the procedures of the medical center, inefficiencies of 
the medical center, and whether the medical center 
follows directives and best practices; 
‘‘(B) establish a remediation plan to improve 
the performance of the medical center; 
‘‘(C) review and assesses the status of any— 
‘‘(i) disciplinary actions taken at the med-
ical center; 
‘‘(ii) recommendations made by the Inspec-
tor General of the Department applicable to the 
medical center; and 
‘‘(iii) findings made by the Comptroller 
General of the United States applicable to the 
medical center; and
‘‘(D) provide training to the director and staff 
of the medical center with respect to carrying out 
such improvements. 
‘‘(3) The Secretary shall ensure that— 
‘‘(A) the director of each underperforming med-
ical center carries out the remediation plan under 
paragraph (2)(B); and 
‘‘(B) the rapid deployment team has access to 
all facilities and all electronic systems, records, re-
ports, audits, reviews, documents, papers, or other 
materials the rapid deployment team determines 
necessary to carry out this subsection. 
‘‘(4) Each rapid deployment team deployed to an 
underperforming medical center under paragraph (1) shall 
consist of— 
‘‘(A) subject matter experts with experience 
in— 
‘‘(i) customer service training; 
‘‘(ii) increasing the efficiency of organiza-
tions; 
‘‘(iii) clinical care specific to the areas in 
which the underperforming medical center re-
quires improvement; and
‘‘(iv) any other areas that the Secretary 
determines appropriate to improve the under-
performing medical center; and 
‘‘(B) an employee of the Office of the Inspector 
General of the Department. 
‘‘(5) To the extent practicable, each rapid deployment 
team shall include process improvement subject matter ex-
perts from the Veterans Experience Office of the Depart-
ment. 
‘‘(6) The Secretary shall determine the duration of 
the deployment of a rapid deployment team under para-
graph (1). 
‘‘(c) INVESTIGATIONS AND WHISTLEBLOWER PRO-
TECTIONS.—(1) The Inspector General of the Department 
shall prioritize investigations relating to underperforming 
medical centers. 
‘‘(2) The Office of Accountability Review shall 
prioritize investigations of whistleblower retaliation relat-
ing to underperforming medical centers. 
‘‘(d) QUARTERLY REPORTS.—On a quarterly basis, 
the Secretary shall submit to Congress a report that in-
cludes, with respect to the quarter covered by the report— 
‘‘(1) each identification of an underperforming 
medical center made by the Secretary;
‘‘(2) the actions taken by the Secretary and 
rapid deployment teams with respect to improving 
underperforming medical centers; and 
‘‘(3) an update on any progress made by each 
underperforming medical center, including whether 
the underperforming medical center is carrying out 
the 
remediation 
plan 
pursuant 
to 
subsection 
(b)(3)(A). 
‘‘(e) RELATIONSHIP TO QUALITY ASSURANCE AND 
NATIONAL QUALITY MANAGEMENT OFFICER.—The re-
quirements of this section are in addition to any require-
ments under sections 7311 and 7311A of this title. 
‘‘(f) DEFINITIONS.—In this section: 
‘‘(1) The term ‘underperforming medical center’ 
means a medical center of the Department that the 
Secretary determines is underperforming under sub-
section (a)(2). 
‘‘(2) The term ‘key health metrics’ means the 
following: 
‘‘(A) The Strategic Analytics Improvement 
and Learning (commonly referred to as ‘SAIL’) 
data used by the Department (or such suc-
cessor data metric). 
‘‘(B) An evaluation system established by 
the Secretary based on the total data described