Hospital Apologizes For 'Unsanitary' Room After Veteran's Father Posts Picture

The father of a United States Army veteran took to Twitter on Friday and posted pictures of a Veterans Affairs Medical Center Hospital exam room that his son was forced to use during treatment for an ankle injury sustained in Iraq.

The picture was posted by Stephen Wilson, father of Christopher Wilson, an Iraq war veteran who served in the U.S. Army for six years.

In his tweet, Stephen described the examination room as “unsanitary and disrespectful."

He also asked his followers to retweet the picture as many times as they can so that President Donald Trump notices it too. The picture that Stephen posted contained an overflowing trash bin and dirty bowls in a sink at the Veterans Affairs clinic in Salt Lake City, Utah.

Christopher also spoke about the incident and said, “I figured they would say, 'Oh, this room's not clean' and take me somewhere else, but they just kind of blew past it, didn't acknowledge it. They're doctors, right? So I figure one of them was going to say 'Let's go somewhere else' or 'Give us a minute to clean it,' but nothing,” Fox News reported.

In response to the complaint, the chief of staff at the George E. Wahlen Department of Veteran Affairs Medical Center, Dr. Karen Gribbin also weighed in on Saturday and said that Christopher should never have been in the room and that the rooms should definitely be cleaned before each patient’s visit.

Gribbin also kick-started an investigation into the matter. Reports state that she also spoke with the veteran and apologized to him saying “we have enjoyed very high patient satisfaction ratings at our facility."

She also thanked Stephen for bringing the matter to her attention. "I do not want another veteran to experience this," she said.

In another incident from the Veterans Affairs Medical Center in Salt Lake City, Utah, the parents of a military veteran resolved a lawsuit against the federal government that alleged that their son died due to poor medical care provided by the hospital.

U.S. District Judge Dee Benson dismissed the wrongful death suit on April 24 at the request of the government and the parents, Gregory Lynn Smith and Jeri Bolinder. However, no details about how the two parties came to a settlement were revealed to the public.

A 1998 graduate of Tooele High School who volunteered for the U.S. Army after the 9/11 attacks and served with the Airborne Infantry in South Korea and Louisiana, Gregory Lee Smith received a medical discharge from the U.S. Army in 2005 after he injured his back.

The 30-year-old later died in 2010, a few days after undergoing back surgery and his parents had alleged that their “son was prematurely discharged from the hospital and that his standard of care fell below the generally accepted standard."

Following his death, the parents filed a lawsuit in 2012 and sought an “unspecified amount of money for economic damages, including funeral expenses, and noneconomic damages, including loss of companionship."