[2014 POLICY AGENDA] 1.4: Strengthen the Quality of Care for Troops and Veterans Troops and veterans deserve high-quality mental health care staffed by highly trained professionals. Veterans are concerned with the quality of the care available; almost 20 percent of respondents to IAVA’s membership survey report that they believe troops and veterans are getting the mental health care that they need.16 Providers must be trained to address the specific concerns of veterans and their families. The VA, DoD, and other government and private entities must continue to invest in research to identify best practices in mental health care and suicide prevention. Existing and emerging research must then be widely disseminated to DoD, the VA and private mental health care professionals. By establishing and creating best practices for service providers across the country, we can ensure that more veterans are getting specialized, quality care wherever they may seek it. Suicide prevention and mental health programs should be regularly evaluated, but few standard methods of gauging performance exist. Researchers should develop standard measures to assess programs and use them to identify successful services. Regular evaluation will allow government, philanthropists, and other stakeholders to invest in what works and help struggling programs to better support troops and veterans.
IAVA Recommendations:
I.
Require TRICARE providers be trained in the identification of PTSD.
II.
Identify all programs related to mental health and suicide prevention; develop clear metrics to assess the impact of mental health and suicide prevention programs at the DoD and VA.
III.
IV.
V.
VI.
Require the VA and DoD to report annually about the impact of existing mental health programs. Reports should include how the program is improving the quality of life for veterans and their families.
Establish and fund a tool to allow for the dissemination and peer review of evidence-based practices for the outreach, engagement and treatment of invisible injuries. This tool should be focused on connecting the mental health community currently treating veterans and be a resource to those who wish to start doing so.
VII.
Ensure that personnel conducting mandated person-to-person mental health screenings for all returning service members are trained to effectively identify these hidden wounds.
Establish and fund a visiting clinician program to allow for the identification of evidence-based practices and to fund an expert in the practice to train other clinicians.
VIII.
Establish a mechanism to better translate evidenced-based research into practice at the DoD and VA.
IX.
Fund the annual VA/DoD Suicide Research Conference.
Develop and promote a nationally recognized certification program that would train mental health professionals in military culture and the unique challenges faced by service members, veterans and their families. This should include best practices in providing care to this community developed by educational programs such as USC School of Social Work’s Military Social Work and Veteran Services sub-concentration.
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