Soldiering On - ' Veterans Affairs Base Case '
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Veterans Affairs Base Case
Organization: U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, a cabinet-level agency of the U.S. government.
Headquarters: 810 Vermont Avenue NW, Washington, D.C. 20420
Phone: (202) 273-5400
Business: To provide American veterans with health and rehabilitation services; employment and educational services; and compensation and benefit payments.
Chief Information Officer: Robert McFarland
Financials: $64 billion budget for 2004 fiscal year; $68 billion requested for 2005 fiscal year.
Challenges: Fully deploy new compensation and pension systems to improve speed and accuracy of claims processing; create two-way, electronic medical-records system with the Department of Defense.
Baseline Goals:
- Cut backlog in unresolved claims, which reached 420,603 at the end of September 2001, to 250,000 claims.
- Reduce the time to process a claim, which was 182 days at the end of September 2003, to 100 days.
- Eliminate the waiting list for vets seeking primary care, from 300,000 in 2001, down to 30,000 earlier this year.
Projects: Processes 
