Top IT experts at the Departments of Treasury and Veterans Affairs (VA) said that the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative (JCDC) program holds a lot of promise, but is “still in its infancy” with program kinks to be worked out. […]

The House of Representatives on May 24 voted to approve legislation that would permanently authorize the Veteran Employment Through Technology Education Courses (VEC-TEC) program, which is run by the Department of Veterans Affairs and subsidizes tuition for veterans training in technology fields. […]

Approximately 82 percent of the Veteran’s Health Administration’s (VHA) resilient high-frequency radio networks (RHFRN) across Veteran’s Affairs (VA) facilities are not operational, the VA Office of Inspector General (OIG) revealed in a report that was publicly released last week. […]

MeriTalk recently sat down with Dewaine Beard, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary (PDAS) in the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Information and Technology (OIT), to talk all things IT modernization and workforce. […]

In the latest update to the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Electronic Health Records Modernization (EHRM) program saga, the agency has decided to delay a scheduled go-live of the EHR system at Ann Arbor Healthcare System facilities. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has made two recent appointments to its Office of Information and Technology (OIT), tasked with collaborating with private-sector technology partners to create the best experience for all veterans in the digital sphere. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) said today that it is transitioning away from its supply chain management system – the Defense Medical Logistics Standard Support (DMLSS) – and is in the market for a new solution contract. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Office of Information and Technology (OIT) has made many strides toward its new vision for digital transformation, but VA CIO Kurt DelBene said today that the agency still has “work to do” to set a proper modernization pace, and could benefit from more modernization funding. […]

The term zero trust is often used as a buzzword, but Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Chief Information Officer (CIO) Kurt DelBene said a successful organization will prioritize security above all else, and have zero trust baked into its workforce culture. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Chief Information Security Officer (CISO) Paul Cunningham has announced his intent to retire, a VA spokesperson confirmed to MeriTalk. […]

Software and cloud services provider Oracle Corp. said today it agreed to buy Cerner Corp., a provider of digital information systems for the health care provider market, in a deal valued at $28 billion. […]

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 Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has released a new cybersecurity strategy intended to protect against exposure of Veterans’ personal information or the corruption of critical data. […]

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) 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. […]

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. […]

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 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. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is looking to consolidate its digital human resources system into one single system and wants a contractor to help manage and support VA’s Enterprise Human Resources Information Services (EHRIS). […]

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. […]

Several House members expressed concern today over the Department of Veterans Affairs’ (VA) approach to managing cyber risks and the agency’s cybersecurity strategies, while the agency’s chief information security officer countered that VA cyber programs are on par with those at work in other Federal agencies. “VA prides itself as being the nation’s largest integrated […]

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. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) has been working hard to reduce the amount of fraud the agency faces when it comes to veterans’ benefits claims, and better leveraging data and AI has been helping in that fight, said Erick Zenteno, program manager of Fraud Prevention Services at VA. […]

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) is pausing its electronic health record (EHR) modernization program for up to 12 weeks to allow for a thorough “strategic review” to ensure program success. […]