The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs takes care of about 9 million veterans at 1,255 services. It is the nation’s largest built-in well being care system.
Charles Dharapak/AP
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Charles Dharapak/AP
The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs takes care of about 9 million veterans at 1,255 services. It is the nation’s largest built-in well being care system.
Charles Dharapak/AP
A nationwide Medicare survey launched as we speak discovered that veterans rated Veterans Affairs hospitals increased than personal well being care services in all 10 classes of affected person satisfaction.
The VA takes care of about 9 million veterans at 1,255 services — the nation’s largest built-in well being care system. Despite many extensively publicized scandals, VA well being care has been persistently rated as aggressive with personal care in dozens of peer-reviewed articles.
“I strongly consider that the VA is the best choice for veteran care. Study after research exhibits that high quality and affected person security is at the very least pretty much as good if not higher than our personal sector counterparts,” mentioned Dr. Shereef Elnahal, VA undersecretary for well being.
This most up-to-date survey, often known as HCAHPS (Hospital Consumer Assessment of Healthcare Providers and Systems), confirmed that the VA beat out personal services in all of the classes surveyed, reminiscent of affected person satisfaction, hospital cleanliness and communication with nurses and medical doctors.
“This presents among the many first alternatives to immediately examine us with our personal sector counterparts, and we’re actually proud of the outcomes however we can’t be content material till 100% of hospitals are pinging in the suitable scores,” Elnahal instructed NPR.
Favorably evaluating with the personal sector is vital for the VA, as a result of Congress has expanded the VA’s use of personal care as an possibility when vets have to attend too lengthy or journey too far for a VA appointment. Private care is rather more costly for the VA.
Republicans in Congress, who usually help higher use of personal care, have even accused the VA of obstructing it. Most just lately, House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs Chairman Mike Bost wrote to VA Secretary Denis McDonough about what he referred to as his “full frustration with the Veterans Health Administration’s lack of well timed motion to offer neighborhood care to veterans that … are in dire want of well timed care.”
“I hope you share my frustration. These roadblocks don’t serve veterans properly and we should do higher,” Bost wrote.