According to a June 7 Military Times article by Patricia Kime, a “blue ribbon panel” studying the future of Veterans Affairs health care is poised to recommend an overhaul to the system that would create a structure similar to the Pentagon’s Tricare program, where veterans could choose to use either the VA for their care or see a network provider.
Under the draft of the commission’s final report, all veterans enrolled in VA care would choose a primary care provider at the VA or from a civilian network. The plan would do away with the 30-day and 40-mile restrictions of the Veterans Choice program and create networks of physicians to care for former troops who prefer to see non-VA doctors.
The report also calls for giving some veterans who received other than honorable discharges access to VA health services. Under the draft, troops who have “substantial honorable service” before they got bad paper discharges would be considered for VA health care eligibility.
