The Department of Veterans Affairs is releasing for public comment a
draft of its strategic report to address key issues facing women
Veterans. The plan outlines steps for improvements to care and services
for women Veterans that are sustainable, accountable and a part of the
department's culture and operations.
"Expanding care and services to women Veterans is too important to limit
ourselves solely to the views within the department, so we are seeking
feedback from all stakeholders, most importantly women Veterans
themselves," said Secretary of Veterans Affairs Eric K. Shinseki. "The
VA must be visionary and agile enough to anticipate and adjust not only
to the coming increase in women Veterans, but also to the complexity and
longevity of treatment needs."
Shinseki formed a task force to develop an action plan to address women
Veterans' issues. Since then, the group has conducted a broad survey of
department experts to identify those issues and organize them by
priority. The draft report is an interim step prior to VA finalizing its
overall plan.
The report comes at an important juncture in VA's history that demands a
review of the quality, quantity, and types of services and programs it
provides to women Veterans. The number of women Veterans using VA has
increased 83 percent in the past decade, from about 160,000 to over
292,000 between fiscal years 2000 and 2009, compared with a 50 percent
increase in men.
Women are now the fastest growing cohort within the Veteran community.
In 2011, about 1.8 million or 8 percent of the 22.2 million Veterans
were women. The male Veteran population is projected to decrease from
20.2 million men in 2010 to 16.7 million by 2020. In contrast, the
number of women Veterans will increase from 1.8 million in 2011 to 2
million in 2020, at which time women will make up 10.7 percent of the
total Veteran population.
VA is training providers in basic and advanced topics in women's health
through mini-residencies, and over 1200 providers have currently
received training. Comprehensive women's health care can be provided
within three different models of care, including comprehensive women's
clinics; separate, but shared, space women's clinics; or integrated
primary care clinics. All of these clinic models ensure that women
receive all of their primary health care (prevention, medical, and
routine gynecologic care) by a single primary care provider. A network
of medical directors and program managers who coordinate care for women
Veterans now encompasses all 153 medical centers in the VA Health Care
System.
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