Doctor advocates for keeping CVTC open

LYNCHBURG, VA – A Lynchburg doctor is advocating to keep the Central Virginia Training Center open.

This comes after nine patients were moved out of the facility since last Summer, and four of them have died.

He's started a petition, and dozens of other doctors have signed on.

Doctor Michael Diminick is an Orthopedic Surgeon at Ortho Virginia.

His office regularly treats patients from the Central Virginia Training Center in Amherst County.

On Thursday, he sent his online petition with more than 70 signatures to Virginia Secretary of Health and Human Resources Bill Hazel in the hopes that he can keep more patients from being taken from the care they receive.
 
Diminick says he has seen the quality of that care first-hand.
 
"They're so frail, many of these patients are twisted and contorted where you can't even straighten out their limbs, and they have osteoporosis, so they're fragile and they break very easily. Despite that, we see very few fractures from these patients out there because of the expertise that the staff has," said Diminick.
 
Diminick says he only learned of the plan to close the training center after two men, Taylor and Tyler Bryant were moved last January to Hiram Davis hospital in Petersburg.

Since then, Tyler has died.
 
"It broke my heart, but it's predictable that things like that are going to happen when you take them out of a place where they've been stable and monitored and so well-cared for," said Diminick.
 
State records show that, since last July, four of the nine individuals moved out of the CVTC have died.

The facility is set to shut down entirely by 2021 as part of an agreement between Virginia and the Department of Justice, but now, after four deaths, the DOJ is investigating what went wrong.
 
"I think it warrants that investigation by the DOJ, ironically the same DOJ which is mandating that the training centers get shut down, is now investigating the results of their mandate," said Diminick.
 
Diminick says, through his petition, he wants to add his voice to the growing number that oppose the decision to close the CVTC, and hopefully persuade his elected officials to keep it open.
 
"My goal would be that, that they realize that we need more beds, and that the best facility with the best healthcare staff there... is right here in Central Virginia," said Diminick.

WSLS reached out to the Department of Behavioral Health and Developmental Services to ask about Hiram Davis Hospital, where five of the remaining patients that were originally at the CVTC are being cared for.

In response, the state says Hiram Davis "Provides services that qualifies it as a training center."

Diminick says he has not yet heard back from the state on his petition.