 USA Today recently featured VHA Shark Tank Competition in its 2024 Veterans Affairs Special Edition Magazine. The article highlights how employees improve VA service through interviews with Blake Henderson, then Diffusion of Excellence Director, and innovators of practices that have won competitions in the past.
Thor Ringler of My Life, My Story describes how the program has crafted more than 10,000 stories to honor the voices and experiences of Veterans. Dr. Jason Dominitz and Chris Moore of Mailed Fecal Immunochemical Test share their proactive approach to colorectal cancer screening through at home tests. Dr. Mark Havran of Physical Therapy Embedded Within Patient-Aligned Care Teams highlights the program’s success with improving access to physical therapy for over 60,000 Veterans.
Dr. Colleen McQuown, who has won two VHA Shark Tank Competitions, describes improving care for older Veterans through VA Geriatric Emergency Department Program and Supporting Community Outpatient, Urgent Care, and Telehealth Services.
The competition “creates a mechanism to identify some of the most amazing things happening across out nationwide health care system,” said Henderson.
USA Today also featured Compassionate Contact Corps as its own story in the magazine, highlighting how the program is combatting loneliness through conversation and companionship. The story draws from perceptive interviews with Lori Murphy, senior social worker, and Dr. Prince Taylor, deputy national director of VA Center for Civic Development and Civic Engagement.
Read the full story for VHA Shark Tank on pages 64-70 and Compassionate Contact Corps on pages 160-162.
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 The 2024 VHA State of Innovation report is available online! With the theme “From Promise to Progress: Evolving Veterans Healthcare,” the 2024 SOI Report has a clear mission: educate Veterans on the ways in which VHA OHIL is advancing and redefining VA health care, and empower them to access these resources. This year’s report is divided into four sections—access to care and services; mental health and social connection; collaboration to deliver innovation; and the future of Veteran health care. The State of Innovation Report feature series will share sneak peaks inside the 2024 SOI Report to explore each of the core sections. This week’s newsletter features projects included in the “Delivering More Together: Collaboration is the New Competition” portion of the report.
Veterans Service Organizations (VSOs) are central to collaborations with industry, academic institutions, non-profits, and government agencies aimed at reaching more Veterans. VSOs represent the Veteran perspective and ensure VA keeps a pulse on Veterans’ most pressing needs. VSOs are the eyes and ears within every community where Veterans live, work, and thrive. VA’s healthcare innovation efforts are focused on ensuring that Veteran feedback shapes the development of innovations as they’re refined, and eventually integrated more broadly into Veteran care. Read more on page 45 of the report.
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Every year, transportation barriers result in 1.8 million missed VA medical appointments, costing VA nearly $4.4 billion annually and reducing Veterans’ overall health outcomes. To address this challenge, VA collaborated with Uber Health to establish the VHA-Uber Health Connect (VUHC) Initiative to offer Veterans a supplemental rideshare transportation option to get to and from their medical appointments. The initiative was spearheaded by Dr. Indra Sandal, Chief of Innovation at VA Tampa Health Care System, and catalyzed by VHA IE, Veteran Transportation Program (VTP), and Uber Health. 263,000 rides have been completed, 38,000 Veterans have been served, and 4 million miles have been traveled between January 2022 and March 2024. The initiative has helped more Veterans get to their medical appointments and has led to an estimated $196.7 million in cost savings for VA. Read more on page 47 of the report.
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For frail Veterans, making the choice to undergo a necessary surgery can be a complicated decision. VA’s Surgical Pause Initiative has transformed VA’s delivery of surgical care. This innovative practice, developed by VHA frontline employees, systematically and rapidly evaluates Veteran frailty to mitigate associated risks and gives Veterans the opportunity to give informed consent and participate in shared decision making. If a surgical pause is triggered based on a Risk Analysis Index (RAI) score above a pre-determined threshold, the surgical teams engage with the Veteran to understand their health priorities. For Veterans who choose surgery, plans can be tailored to optimize the surgical outcome prior to surgery. The success of this initiative is rooted in the collaborative efforts of various departments within VA and external organizations, demonstrating the power of teamwork in advancing Veteran health care. Read more on page 55 of the report.
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Join us for the November installment of The Exchange. This month’s topic is Everything Mission Daybreak. The Exchange will be November 21, 2024, at 3:00pm EST. This month there will be a unique panel discussion featuring Dr. Amanda Lienau, the Director of Open Innovation, and the Mission Daybreak team.
In this session, attendees will gain insights into how Mission Daybreak is accelerating innovative solutions to reduce Veteran suicides. With over 500 Veterans, spouses, and experts helping guide product design and development, Mission Daybreak is delivering suicide prevention solutions and saving lives, legacies, and communities.
This event will provide a platform to ask questions, share ideas, and engage in thoughtful discussions on current project efforts that are underway, provide feedback on current design, and engage attendees who may be interested in participating in pilot projects.
VHA Innovation Ecosystem’s Incubator Series continues on Thursday, December 5, with a session on measuring the impact of innovation. Being able to measure impact and provide data is a key component of successfully scaling your innovation. This class will show approaches to tracking process, sharing it with internal and external stakeholders, and providing Veterans with the most effective solutions.
If you missed the Incubator’s last session on cultivating growth resources, you can watch the recording here. Panelists discussed identifying risks and securing material and personnel resources to scale innovation across a nationwide network. The Incubator series runs through January, each session focusing on a different aspect of the innovation lifecycle, from designing a solution to scaling your innovation. All classes also qualify for TMS credit.
Sign up for any or all classes in the series to join us in creating innovative change across VA to help better the lives of Veterans!
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