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At the Orlando VA Healthcare System, women Veterans meet regularly for “Perinatal Veterans Socials” to share their experiences, challenges, and triumphs in navigating pregnancy and motherhood while transitioning from military life. These Socials foster a sense of belonging, offering attendees a space to connect, support each other, and access vital resources through VA perinatal services, which are specialized to focus on the health of women or birthing people and their babies before, during, and after birth.
Melissa Tran, a 2023 VHA Innovation Ecosystem Senior Innovation Fellow, Marriage and Family Therapist, and Reproductive Health Program Manager at VA Orlando, founded a program called PREPARe (Perinatal Reproductive Education Planning and Resources) to better support Veterans on their reproductive health journeys. Tran organized these socials among her patients with an understanding of the importance of social connection and a desire to provide space for community among her patients. Lureida Soto and Regina Adamson are two Veterans who joined the first Perinatal Veterans Social. Adamson, a U.S. Army Veteran who faced difficulties with postpartum mental health, described her experience of feeling lost before connecting with perinatal services, saying “Melissa is creating our village, making sure our village is not forgotten. She’s connected me with women who understand me on a deeper level—emotionally and mentally.”
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Hurricane Helene brought devastating rainfall to Asheville, North Carolina, washing out roads, damaging bridges, and spawning landslides. More than two weeks after the storm, the home of an 80-year-old Veteran on the outskirts of town was still unreachable by car. This Veteran is enrolled in Supporting Community Outpatient, Urgent Care & Telehealth Services (SCOUTS), an at-home care program that follows Emergency Department (ED) visits for Veterans at risk for physical, cognitive or functional decline, as well as hospitalization, falls, and repeat ED visits. SCOUTS was created by 2025 VHA Innovation Ecosystem Senior Innovation Fellow Dr. Colleen McQuown.
Corey Anderson, an Intermediate Care Technician from the Asheville VA Medical Center providing SCOUTS services, still needed to reach his patient’s home. Anderson parked his van, gathered his medical gear and a few supplies, and set out on foot on a half-mile incline to reach the 80-year-old Veteran.
“It didn’t feel like a choice. It’s like, there was no turning around and going back to the VA and saying, ‘I just couldn’t make it,’” Anderson said in a telephone interview this week. “That just couldn’t happen.”
Read more about Asheville’s recovery following Hurricane Helene and the work being done at VA to continue care for Veterans in the area, here.
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From November 19 - 21, innovators gathered in Chicago for the VHA Innovator Network's (iNET) annual Bootcamp event. Bootcamp is an annual gathering of frontline innovators looking to create change in VA. All attendees are a part of iNET’s Spark-Seed-Spread Innovation Investment and Accelerator Program, designed to empower employees to identify challenges and create solutions to enhance the experiences of Veterans, caregivers, and VA employees.
On the first day of the event, four local Veterans spoke with Innovation Specialist Chad Franche on the importance of building relationships and engaging Veterans in the care they receive.
The rest of the day was filled with multiple breakout sessions designed to foster connections between fellow innovators, innovation specialists, and VA facility leadership, as well as focus on specific problem areas, such as mental health and primary care. Additionally, leaders from VHA's Office of Healthcare Innovation and Learning shared their experience and advice for innovating in different spheres. Attendees began day two by creating symbolic “game pieces” to represent their innovation journey. Dr. Mark Zhang, Director of OHIL, gave closing remarks encouraging attendees to embrace collaboration across VA and “look at what interesting things can happen at the intersections of intersections.”
The final day featured a fireside chat with James McLain, Executive Director at VA Milwaukee Health Care System and Staci Williams, Executive Director at VA Illiana Health Care System, who both asserted that VA is perfectly situated for innovation. iNET's Bootcamp showcased VA employees’ passion and dedication to transforming care for Veterans through innovation.
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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.
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 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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VHA Innovation Ecosystem proudly collaborates with the Catalyst Fellowship Program at MIT linQ to support Fellows from the VA and MIT communities to discover and develop Veterans’ health innovations. The Catalyst program takes Fellows through two phases. Phase 1 allows Fellows to explore potential projects while Phase 2 centers on project execution.
As part of the partnership with VHA, Dr. Indra Sandal, a 2021 VHA IE Entrepreneur in Residence and Chief of Innovation at the James A. Haley Veterans Hospital in Tampa, FL., supported the Phase 2 Pilot Program Steering committee. “The rigor of the work, involvement of diverse talent, and relentless focus on Veterans’ health care needs found in Catalyst is unlike anything in the country today,” said Dr. Sandal. “Our successful pilot demonstration gives me great confidence we can fulfill our promise to deliver the innovation Veterans deserve.”
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