User:Dchild21/sandbox

Number of Facilities: 1255

Veterans Covered: 9.3 Million

Budget 2020: $85 Billion

VHA Nationalized Healthcare System
The Veterans Health Administration is a form of nationalized healthcare service in the United States that provides healthcare to Veterans. What makes this type of healthcare different from other forms in the United States is that everything is owned by and operated by the Department of Veterans Affairs as opposed to private companies which is what we see in other parts of the health care market. This means that all the medical facilities that are part of the VHA are owned by the US Government and all the doctors and workers at the facilities are payed by the government. What is a more common model in the United States is that consumers have private health insurance and the medical facilities used are all privatized. As of 2017 the Census found that 67.2% of Americans have private health coverage. Since the VHA is nationalized they receive funding from the Department of Veterans Affairs, which is allocated funds by the federal government. Because of this, Veterans that qualify for VHA healthcare do not pay premiums or deductibles for their healthcare, but may have to make copayments depending on what procedure they are having. The funding the VA receives is split into mandatory, which is an amount of spending dictated by law, and discretionary spending, which is spending that can be adjusted year to year. In 2020 the budget given to the VA was $220.2 billion, of which 56% was mandatory spending and 44% was discretionary. From the discretionary funding, 87.6% was allocated to medical programs which came to a total VHA budget of $85 billion.

Veterans Health Administration scandal of 2014
Since the 2014 scandal in which the quality administration of health care by the VA was brought into question due to long wait times and secret waiting lists, the VA claims wait times have improved. According to a study conducted by the Journal of the American Medical Association, JAMA, in 2014 the average wait times to receive health care from the VHA was a little longer, but still comparable to wait times to see private doctors. The 2014 wait times JAMA found were 22.5 and 18.7 days for the VHA and private doctors respectively. The study also found that three years later, in 2017, VHA wait times were significantly shorter than wait times to see a private doctor. The wait times in 2017 were 17.7 and 29.8 days for the VHA and private doctors respectively.

Physicians
Currently the VHA is experiencing a physician shortage and as of 2018 10% of jobs in the VHA remain unfilled. This shortage can be especially harmful to Veterans since a quarter of Veterans live in rural areas. These are the kind of areas that are most vulnerable to a shortage since they are already isolated and it can be hard to get access to the healthcare they need.