A recent report from the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Inspector General (OIG) revealed limitations with the VA’s patient scheduling system, a component of the agency’s new electronic health record (EHR) system. […]
While the COVID-19 pandemic pushed forward massive advancements in telehealth, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has taken it one step – or more – further and is using virtual reality (VR) and augmented reality (AR) in nearly 50 sites for clinical care, an official said Nov. 8. […]
The White House plans to nominate Kurt DelBene to the positions of CIO and Assistant Secretary for Information and Technology at the Department of Veterans Affairs, which has come under fire in recent months from Congress over a troubled roll-out and cost estimates for its electronic health records modernization (EHRM) program. […]
Despite recent scrutiny over program missteps and complaints from frontline staff, the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program plans to deploy the EHRM program at a second location in Columbus, Ohio, in February 2022, VA Deputy Secretary Donald Remy told lawmakers today. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program has been under fire in recent months after two VA Office of Inspector General’s (OIG) reports revealed program missteps and underreported, unreported, or unknown program costs. In response, the VA pledged to provide a full lifecycle cost estimate of the program – which Congress wanted to see within 90 days – but a VA official said today that the cost estimate will take at least 12 months to complete. […]
Paul Cunningham, chief information security officer (CISO) at the Department of Veterans (VA), explained this week how the agency is addressing cybersecurity vulnerabilities to protect its users and their health care and financial data as the agency has turned increasingly to providing telehealth services for veterans. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has seen a nine percent increase in Veterans Health Administration (VHA) employees that have received the COVID-19 vaccine since the VA mandated the shot, but is still facing a 12 percent unvaccinated share of VHA employees with only a few weeks left before the Oct. 8 deadline. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has named Dr. Neil Evans as its new acting chief information officer (CIO), the agency confirmed to MeriTalk. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is working on a remote telepresence technology that will transform the way veterans receive their healthcare and soon allow all veterans to receive the same level of care, no matter where they live, according to a top VA official and doctor. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) – which has already made much use of artificial intelligence (AI) technologies to provide more efficient, effective, and responsive services for its users – is also working on an AI trustworthiness framework that aims to avoid biases that can result from use of the technology, explained a VA official during a virtual GovLoop training on August 12. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is expanding its COVID-19 vaccine mandate on Aug. 13 to include most Veterans Health Administration (VHA) employees, volunteers, contractors, or anyone who comes in contact with VA patients and healthcare workers as part of their job, the agency announced today. Additionally, the National Guard, part of the Department of […]
The COVID-19 pandemic allowed the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to accelerate its digital transformation efforts in a way that wasn’t possible before the public health crisis, a VA official said this week, while explaining how the agency quickly adapted to become more agile and take advantage of previous investments in digital transformation solutions. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) awarded a seven-year, $497 million contract to enterprise IT provider Peraton to provide IT infrastructure-as-a-managed-service (IaaMS), the firm announced August 2. […]
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Sec. Dennis McDonough has tasked Deputy Secretary Donald Remy to oversee the department’s troubled Electronic Health Record Modernization (EHRM) program. […]
Amid a nationwide spike in COVID-19 cases due to the Delta variant, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) announced today that all healthcare staff will be required to receive the COVID-19 vaccine. The VA is the first Federal agency to mandate its personnel receive the vaccine, though other agencies have publicly encouraged their staff to be vaccinated. […]
Dan McCune, the acting associate deputy assistant secretary of the Enterprise Program Management Office at the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), talked about major themes in the agency’s IT modernization approach during a virtual webinar hosted by Federal News Network on July 21. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) Office of Information and Technology is seeking a contractor to maintain an Authority to Operate (ATO) for the Social Security Numbers Reduction (SSNR) Tool in the VA Enterprise Cloud (VAEC) environment. […]
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Denis McDonough has called the recent VA Office of the Inspector General’s (OIG) reports highlighting the Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program missteps “extremely disappointing,” but told members of Congress on July 14 that he is proposing a new approach for the program he hopes will get VA’s efforts “back on track.” […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of the Inspector General’s (OIG) investigation of the VA’s Electronic Health Records (EHR) modernization program has found an additional $2.5 billion in unreported IT infrastructure upgrade costs, which could put the program cost up to $5.1 billion more than estimated. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) believes it has enough IT funding this year to slowly start reducing its technical debt for the first time, agency leaders said today during a House Committee on Veterans’ Affairs hearing on the fiscal year 2022 (FY2022) VA IT budget. […]
The House Appropriations Committee agreed with the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) $4.8 billion IT systems budget request for Fiscal Year 2022, but cut $26 million from the VA’s request for funding for its electronic health records (EHR) project. […]
A new report from the Office of the Inspector General (OIG) found that the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) puts veterans’ sensitive information and facility security at risk by not following requirements about documenting personal identity verification (PIV) cards returned by contract personnel. […]
Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Secretary Denis McDonough said he expects some results from a strategic review of VA’s electronic health records (EHR) system that began in March to be delivered in the next couple of weeks. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has awarded a 12-year $725 million contract to AT&T to modernize the agency’s IP-based data communication platform and drive mission outcomes. […]
President Biden’s Fiscal Year (FY) 2022 budget includes an estimated $58.439 billion in IT spending for Federal civilian agencies, and $500 million for the General Service Administration’s (GSA) Technology Modernization Fund (TMF), according to a budget breakdown the White House released today. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of the Inspector General’s (OIG) strategic review of the VA’s Electronic Health Records (EHR) program has found that the agency underestimated program costs by between $1 billion and $2.6 billion. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has awarded a $1.1 billion contract to Booz Allen Hamilton to assist the department with its Benefits Integration Platform (BIP) initiative. […]
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) has outlined 28 priority open recommendations for the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) in a new report, which include items involving information technology and timely COVID-19 data collection. […]
The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) will pilot a program to assess the competencies of AI practitioners to ensure that the AI workforce at the VA is knowledgeable and capable of producing trustworthy results with the technology, according to Gil Alterovitz, director of artificial intelligence at VA. […]
Ensuring customers are happy is important, but Federal customer experience (CX) experts believe ensuring employees are happy is equally important. Federal experts say the same human-centered design framework can be applied to both CX and employee experience (EX) to give agencies a competitive advantage. […]