The Veterans Health Administration

The Veterans Health Administration

The Veterans Health Administration

Abstract

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA), one of three departments within the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), is the largest integrated health system in the United States. Veterans Health Administration (VHA) is the component of the United States Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) that implements the medical assistance program of the VA through the administration and operation of numerous VA outpatient clinics, hospitals, medical centers and long-term healthcare facilities. In the 1990’s the system was tarnished with poor patient care, and unsafe practices. By the mid 1990’s, the veterans health-care system was in deep crisis. A quarter of its hospital beds were empty. Government audits showed that many VHA surgeons had gone a year without picking up a scalpel. However, the VHA has turned around. The Department of Veteran’s Affairs reinvented during the past 15 years through structural and organizational change, measurement and accountability for quality and value and development of an information infrastructure for supporting the needs of patients, clinicians, and administrators.

The Veterans Health Administration (VHA), one of three departments within the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), is the largest integrated health system in the United States. Suffering in the early 1980’s and 1990’s from a tarnished reputation of bureaucracy, inefficiency, and mediocre care, the VA sought to reinvent itself beginning in the mid-90’s as a model system characterized by patient-centered, high-quality healthcare. (Perlin, Kolodner & Roswell, 2004)
The origin of the VHA dates back to the first federal military veteran’s hospital in Pittsburgh in 1778. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) was established as an independent agency under the President by Executive Order on July 21, 1930, and signed by President Herbert Hoover. In 1946 The Department of Medicine & Surgery was established, succeeded in...

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