The Maui News - The Department of Veterans Affairs announced last week it has hired a doctor and a physician’s assistant for the Maui Community Based Outpatient Clinic in Kahului, bringing the facility to full staffing. The hiring of Dr. James Lockyer and physician’s assistant Norman Mallory comes after a full-time doctor was dismissed from the clinic in early May and Maui veterans staged sign-waving protests late that month and in June. The clinic has had problems with retaining and recruiting doctors, leaving island veterans skeptical of continuity of care provided by the facility. Fred Ballard, public affairs officer with the VA Pacific Islands Health Care System, said that with the Maui clinic now fully staffed, it will be possible for registered nurse practitioner Kate Harper-Schmidt to begin providing home-based primary care. Lockyer is a board-certified internist with 20 years of experience. Mallory has more than nine years of experience, most recently at the VA Medical Center in Togus, Maine.