VA’s Tablet Program Delivering Telehealth to Veterans

Department’s electronic tablet program helps to overcome social and clinical health care barriers

By U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs - September 16, 2019

Lt. Michael White, a nurse at Naval Hospital Jacksonville’s intensive care unit, uses telehealth to discuss patient statuses and recommendations with Tiffany Ingram, a nurse at Naval Medical Center San Diego. Telehealth is the use of telecommunications and information technologies to provide health assessment, diagnosis, treatment, consultation, education, and health-related information across distances. White, a native of Boise, Idaho, says, “Telehealth provides us the opportunity to access those critical care resources to help mitigate staffing shortages. From a nursing standpoint, it gives us a second pair of critical care nursing eyes on the patient data to potentially catch any signs or symptoms that might get missed by the assigned nurse.” (U.S. Navy photo by Jacob Sippel, Naval Hospital Jacksonville/Released).

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) was recently recognized in studies by two independent peer-review journals — JAMIA Open and Psychiatric Services — for efforts to deliver trusted, easy access and high-quality online health care services to Veterans with complex health care needs or residing in remote areas.

The department’s tablet program is one part of VA’s extensive telehealth program. The VA’s use of technology to enhance care options for Veterans is supported by the VA MISSION Act.

“Telehealth technology remains a vital platform to provide high-quality health care to all Veterans, regardless of challenges they may face in accessing care,” said VA Secretary Robert Wilkie. “VA’s tablet program is a model that other networked health care systems across the country can mirror, and demonstrates the potential of telehealth capabilities in the years to come.”

According to the JAMIA Open study published Aug. 5, VA’s initiative to distribute video telehealth tablets to high-need patients appears to have successfully reached Veterans with social and clinical access barriers, including Veterans in rural areas and patients with mental health conditions.

The study published by Psychiatric Services, Aug. 5, validates that the initiative also appears to improve access and continuity of mental health services of Veterans with mental health conditions. Furthermore, researchers discovered that VA’s efforts are improving clinical efficiency by decreasing missed opportunities for care.