[Federal Register Volume 79, Number 214 (Wednesday, November 5, 2014)]
[Notices]
[Pages 65771-65773]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 2014-26274]


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DEPARTMENT OF VETERANS AFFAIRS


Publication of Wait-Times for the Department for the Veterans 
Choice Program

AGENCY: Department of Veterans Affairs.

ACTION: Notice.

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SUMMARY: The Veterans Access, Choice, and Accountability Act of 2014 
directs the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) to publish wait times 
for the scheduling of appointments in each VA facility for primary 
care, specialty care, and hospital care and medical services. This 
Federal Register Notice announces VA's publication of the wait times.

ADDRESSES: The wait-time data for all Veterans Health Administration 
(VHA) medical centers and clinics is available on the following Web 
site: http://www.va.gov/health/access-audit.asp.

[[Page 65772]]


FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Ms. Kristin J. Cunningham, Director, 
Business Policy (10NB6), Chief Business Office, Veterans Health 
Administration, 810 Vermont Avenue NW., Washington, DC 20420, 
Telephone: (202) 382-2508. (This is not a toll-free number.)

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: Section 206 of the Veterans Access, Choice, 
and Accountability Act of 2014 (Pub. L. 113-146, ``the Act'') directs 
the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), not later than 90 days after 
the date of the enactment of the Act, to publish in the Federal 
Register, and on a publicly-accessible Internet Web site of each VA 
Medical Center, the wait-times for the scheduling of an appointment in 
each VA facility by a veteran for the receipt of primary care, 
specialty care, and hospital care and medical services based on the 
general severity of the condition of the veteran. Whenever the wait-
times for the scheduling of such an appointment change, the Secretary 
is also required to publish the revised wait times on a publicly-
accessible Internet Web site of each VA Medical Center not later than 
30 days after such change, and in the Federal Register not later than 
90 days after such change.
    This Federal Register Notice announces the publication of the wait-
times of the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) for primary care, 
specialty care, and mental health care as required by section 206 of 
the Act. VA is working to develop an accurate method for tracking and 
reporting wait times for hospital care and medical services and will 
begin reporting that data as soon as it is available.
    This data release contains a new method of reporting. The previous 
method calculated wait time based on the create date (the date an 
appointment is made) and based on the desired date for scheduling an 
appointment. The previous method also reported data separately for new 
and established patients. The current method uses the date that an 
appointment is deemed clinically appropriate by a VA health care 
provider, or if no such clinical determination has been made, the date 
a veteran prefers to be seen, to calculate wait times and reports the 
wait times for all patients combined. This is consistent with the wait-
time goals of VHA published in the Federal Register on October 17, 
2014. 79 FR 62519. As required by section 206, the new data is also 
reported for each VHA facility, down to the level of Community-Based 
Outpatient Clinics.
    For this release, VA is publishing two reports, one that provides 
wait times data as of October 1 based on the previous reporting method, 
and one that reports the wait-times data for the same time period based 
on current reporting method. VA will continue to report average wait 
times using both methods for a period of time sufficient for veterans 
to become accustomed to the new reporting method.
    The following is a summary of the wait times data, based on 
preferred appointment date, that is published at http://www.va.gov/health/access-audit.asp. This data can also be accessed from the Web 
sites of each VA Medical Center following the release of each update. 
The average wait times for primary care, specialty care, and mental 
health care by Veterans Integrated Service Network (VISN) are provided 
in the following tables:

                                 Sample Table Wait Times by VISN: Current Method
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                   Primary care   Specialty care   Mental health
                              VISN                                 average wait    average wait    average wait
                                                                       time            time            time
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VISN 1..........................................................            4.60            5.50            4.30
VISN 2..........................................................            3.24            7.54            3.82
VISN 3..........................................................            2.39            4.66            1.94
VISN 4..........................................................            4.24            8.13            2.67
VISN 5..........................................................            7.83            6.69            4.14
VISN 6..........................................................           13.49            8.12            6.83
VISN 7..........................................................           11.29            7.93            4.89
VISN 8..........................................................            3.75            7.90            2.53
VISN 9..........................................................            8.04            4.61            4.12
VISN 10.........................................................            4.60            6.94            2.77
VISN 11.........................................................            3.67            4.71            1.99
VISN 12.........................................................            5.32            7.73            3.67
VISN 15.........................................................            2.59            5.95            2.51
VISN 16.........................................................            7.52            7.12            4.37
VISN 17.........................................................            9.72            5.95            7.16
VISN 18.........................................................           10.98           10.59            7.50
VISN 19.........................................................           10.28            8.50            8.33
VISN 20.........................................................            6.18            7.75            1.91
VISN 21.........................................................            6.71            9.77            2.78
VISN 22.........................................................            6.66            9.05            4.78
VISN 23.........................................................            3.94            5.00            2.35
----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: Wait Time is calculated from the veteran's preferred date or clinically appropriate date. Average wait
  time represents the average number of days patients are waiting for an appointment as of 10/1/2014. Primary
  Care is composed of three DSS Stop Codes, Specialty Care is composed of 41 DSS Stop Codes, and Mental Health
  is composed of 7 DSS Stop codes.


                                               Sample Table Wait Times by VISN: Previous Reporting Method
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
                                                                                                            Established     Established
                                                            New primary    New specialty    New mental        patient         patient       Established
                          VISN                             care average    care average   health average   primary care   specialty care  patient mental
                                                             wait time       wait time       wait time     average wait     average wait  health average
                                                                                                               time            time          wait time
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
VISN 1..................................................           36.99           39.24           26.55            4.51            5.15            4.23
VISN 2..................................................           36.77           48.57           28.69            3.14            6.63            3.72
VISN 3..................................................           23.58           32.37           26.56            2.35            4.15            1.86

[[Page 65773]]

 
VISN 4..................................................           35.73           41.36           30.92            4.14            7.74            2.57
VISN 5..................................................           52.26           39.27           64.56            7.29            6.36            4.08
VISN 6..................................................           55.99           43.68           37.63           12.50            7.58            6.52
VISN 7..................................................           50.37           48.28           34.14           10.27            6.89            4.62
VISN 8..................................................           44.26           46.52           33.17            3.66            7.09            2.44
VISN 9..................................................           54.96           47.08           34.62            7.66            4.18            4.02
VISN 10.................................................           32.09           37.47           34.05            4.39            6.37            2.68
VISN 11.................................................           30.22           39.91           25.51            3.50            4.28            1.82
VISN 12.................................................           27.10           36.77           29.14            5.23            7.35            3.64
VISN 15.................................................           35.79           43.30           31.82            2.45            5.27            2.47
VISN 16.................................................           37.73           43.85           35.98            7.23            6.69            4.17
VISN 17.................................................           47.43           36.06           29.92            9.27            5.64            6.97
VISN 18.................................................           38.86           42.97           41.71           10.61            9.59            7.36
VISN 19.................................................           49.40           43.73           33.91            8.56            7.34            8.13
VISN 20.................................................           37.48           49.88           39.77            5.98            6.05            1.81
VISN 21.................................................           33.24           41.10           28.44            6.69            9.16            2.64
VISN 22.................................................           34.35           43.73           39.56            6.35            8.21            4.44
VISN 23.................................................           29.89           43.12           33.76            3.89            4.33            2.25
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Note: Wait Time is calculated from appointment create date for new patient appointments and from appointment desired date for established patient
  appointments. Average wait time represents the average number of days patients are waiting for an appointment as of 10/1/2014. Primary Care is
  composed of three DSS Stop Codes, Specialty Care is composed of 41 DSS Stop Codes, and Mental Health is composed of 7 DSS Stop codes.

Signing Authority

    The Secretary of Veterans Affairs, or designee, approved this 
document and authorized the undersigned to sign and submit the document 
to the Office of the Federal Register for publication electronically as 
an official document of the Department of Veterans Affairs. Jose D. 
Riojas, Chief of Staff, approved this document on October 30, 2014, for 
publication.

    Dated: October 31, 2014.
William F. Russo,
Acting Director, Office of Regulation Policy & Management, Office of 
the General Counsel, Department of Veterans Affairs.
[FR Doc. 2014-26274 Filed 11-4-14; 8:45 am]
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