NORTH LAS VEGAS (KTNV) — National leaders are taking tips from Las Vegas about how to care for U.S. veterans.
On Friday, the Under Secretary of Veterans Affairs for Health, Dr. Shereef Elnahal, stopped by the North Las Vegas VA Medical Center. He said he was impressed by what he saw.
"So many great initiatives are happening here, everything from veteran homelessness to suicide prevention, but also just really making strides and setting the example on veteran access to care," Elnahal said. I talked about the leader here about our clinic operations group practice manager who presented to the entire country what they were doing here for improving veteran wait times. We're really trying to learn from the Las Vegas VA because of the excellence that's here."
He said one challenge that VA care is facing is growth and meeting veterans' needs.
"We hired more than 61,000 people across the country to include hundreds of new employees here at the Las Vegas VA," Elnahal said. "I know that this medical center is bursting through the seams as we're trying to make every possible use of the resources we have."
Elnahal said some of the issues the VA is hoping to improve on is providing resources and care for veteran homelessness, drug addiction, and suicide rates.
RELATED LINK: Southern Nevada homelessness rates jump over 16%, according to census
"Suicide prevention is my top clinical priority. One veteran suicide is too many and there are a lot of things we can do for crisis care," Elnahal said. "We're funding community coalitions across the country. We're doing things like distributing gun locks to as many veterans as possible just to have their guns stored safely at home. These are simple but important things that we can do much better."
He mentioned the COMPACT Act, which allows the VA to pay for care that veterans need in suicide crisis, whether they are enrolled in VA health care or not. That includes transportation costs, inpatient or crisis residential care for up to 30 days, and outpatient care for up to 90 days.
As for the future, Elnahal said he wants to make sure systems continue to be successful and are maintained to help others.
"Over 90% of veterans trust the VA for their care and I think the last thing we need is a set of decisions from Washington that force us to divest and remove resources from veterans," Elnahal said. "We know that the care demand is only going to go up for veterans as they age, on average, but also because of the PACT Act, the groundbreaking legislation that President Biden signed into law last August that finally allows us to be there for veterans with conditions related to toxic substance exposure during their service. And so, those two things are just going to drive a higher care demand for veterans and we absolutely have to stay ahead of it by providing the most accessibly system that we possibly can."
