The Department of Veterans Affairs will recommend closing at least three medical centers and 174 outpatient health clinics and building roughly 255 new health care facilities and nursing homes to improve veterans' medical services, according to briefings given by the department the week of March 8 and leaked planning documents.
The documents, first obtained by Military Times, show the VA will recommend increasing its overall number of health facilities by 78.
But the expansion also includes increasing partnerships with private hospitals to provide approved care for veterans without access to a VA medical center.
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While details of the recommendations have yet to be made public — they are expected to be published March 14 in the Federal Register — VA officials have been on the offensive in the past week, briefing veterans service organizations, unions and employees on the recommendations, part of an ongoing review of VA real estate and infrastructure.
VA Secretary Denis McDonough said Thursday the recommendations would improve overall access and quality of care and were designed to meet “the needs of 21st century veterans, not the needs and challenges of veterans in a health care system built years ago.”
“[They] will importantly strengthen our leading role as health care researchers in America and as the leading health care training institution in…
