Potential Costs of Veterans' Health Care

Abstract

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) provides health care at little or no charge to more than 5 million veterans annually. Medical services are provided through the inpatient and outpatient facilities run by the Veterans Health Administration. Those services include routine health assessments, readjustment counseling, surgery, hospitalization, and nursing home care. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that the future costs for VA to treat enrolled veterans will be substantially higher (in inflation-adjusted dollars) than recent appropriations for that purpose, partly because more veterans are likely to seek care in the VA system but mostly because health care costs per enrolled veteran are projected to increase faster than the overall price level. Under two scenarios that CBO examined, the total real resources (in 2010 dollars) necessary to provide health care services to all veterans who seek treatment at VA would range from $69 billion to $85 billion in 2020, representing cumulative increases of roughly 45 percent to 75 percent since 2010.

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Document Details

Document Type
Technical Report
Publication Date
Oct 01, 2010
Accession Number
ADA561806

Entities

Organizations

  • Congressional Budget Office

Tags

DTIC Thesaurus Topics

  • Anxiety Disorders
  • Brain Injuries
  • Contingency Operations (Military)
  • Health Care
  • Health Services
  • Hospitals
  • Law
  • Medical Personnel
  • Military Personnel
  • Patient Care
  • Therapy
  • Traumatic Stress Disorder

Readers

  • Life Cycle Cost Analysis
  • Medical or Health Care Field.
  • Rehabilitation and Prosthetic Care for Military Service Members and Veterans with Limb Loss or Disability.