Veteran Among Veterans' Health-Care Leaders Retires After 59 Years Of Federal Service

February 28, 1998

GAINESVILLE—America’s longest-serving administrator of veterans’ health-care services, Malcom Randall, will retire in April as director of the Gainesville Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

At 81, he is ending the active segment of a career he also has described as “my avocation and recreation.”

A visionary force with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs and with VA services to war veterans of Florida and South Georgia, Randall will conclude 59 years of federal service. His tenure is unsurpassed in length and distinguished by a caliber of service that has won acclaim from three U.S. presidents and top VA administrators.

Deputy Secretary of the VA, Hershel Gober describes Randall as “a true giant in the health-care profession whose legacy of achievement will continue to impact medical care in general for many yeas to come.

“Malcom has been at the forefront of planning and implementing new programs to meet the changing health-care requirements of veterans. Always concerned about patients foremost, in the 1970s he set forth a Code of Patient Concern that has served as a model for patients’ rights and customer service,” Gober said.

Randall’s life is interwoven with VA history, dating back to the end of World War II when a select group of medical leaders began to transform the entire health-care system for veterans. A native of East St. Louis, Ill., and a graduate of St. Louis University with a master’s degree in hospital administration, he joined this group in aggressive efforts to upgrade medical care for those who fought to preserve the nation’s freedom.

Gov. Lawton Chiles plans to recognize Randall March 24 with a proclamation at a full Cabinet meeting in Tallahassee, after which he will be honored at a luncheon hosted by the executive director of the Florida Department of Veterans Affairs. Additional honors are planned by VA administrators and Gainesville VA employees, as well as leaders of the University of Florida.

Randall, whose active service with the Navy during World War II enables him to relate closely to veteran patients, is known throughout Florida. He has influenced the scope and quality of health care for an estimated 1.7 million military service veterans statewide.

In addition to his 32 years as director of the VAMC in Gainesville, he has helped establish VA hospitals and outpatient clinics in other Florida cities. As medical district director from 1973 to 1990, he supervised VA health-care services for most of Florida and 19 counties in South Georgia.

Winner of the VA’s two highest service awards, Randall also has been recognized twice for “most outstanding performance” among 127 VA hospital administrators nationwide. For many years, he led the development of policies related to veterans’ health care while at the helm of the VA Chief Medical Director’s Field Advisory Council. He is the only VA employee ever elected to the Institute of Medicine of the National Academy of Sciences.

Among his many contributions, Randall considers his national leadership in promoting VA hospital affiliations with university medical schools the most significant.

“The superb quality of VA health-care services today is due in large measure to these collaborative ties, which set up a win-win situation—enabling VA hospitals to benefit directly from the research discoveries that occur at university-based medical colleges and enabling the medical schools to share VA resources and talents,” said Randall.

Malcom arrived in Gainesville in 1966 to oversee construction of the VAMC, which became a national model for an exceptionally close working partnership with a university—involving collaboration in research, teaching of health professionals and patient care. Randall himself crusaded for building this facility across the street from the UF Health Science Center and the closely affiliated teaching hospital known as Shands at UF.

“Malcom Randall, more than any individual I know, has been an important force in the academic growth of the Health Science Center—from its fragile beginnings in the rural outposts of Florida into a nationally prominent center of research, education and patient care,” said Dr. David Challoner, UF vice president for health affairs. “He has made sure the Department of Veterans Affairs remains an integral player in the Health Science Center and a vital contributor to the quality of programs that benefit both UF and the VA.”

Randall has steered the Gainesville VAMC’s growth into a regional system now serving 10,000 inpatients and handling 250,000 outpatient visits every year. More than 2,000 people are employed at the Gainesville center and its clinics in Jacksonville and Daytona Beach, while more than 1,500 students complete parts of their health professional education there each year.