Representative Annie Kuster https://kuster.house.gov from New Hampshire and a member of the House Veterans Affairs Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, recently along with other co-sponsors, introduced the “Enhancing Veterans Experience with Telehealth Service Act (eVETS. The legislation seeks to remove barriers that stand in the way of vital, evidence-based treatments for veterans with PTSD.
The co-sponsors are Representatives Carol Shea Porter from New Hampshire, Bruce Poliquin from Maine, Alex Mooney from West Virginia, Greg Gianforte from Montana, Bruce Westerman from Arkansas, and Peter Welch from Vermont.
Representative Kuster reports, “In rural communities in New Hampshire, the nearest VA facility can be hours away to provide care and qualified private therapists are few, so by rapidly expanding the VA’s offering of telehealth to these areas will help veterans receive the care they need.”
eVETS seeks to expand the VA’s offering for telehealth treatments for PTSD to veterans living in rural areas in ten states. These ten states possess the highest per capita rates in rural communities for about 674,000 veterans, including 47,000 Granite State veterans according to data from the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey.
The bill would allow veterans to choose between two extensively researched methods of treatment, such as prolonged exposure therapy and cognitive processing therapy. Each patient is also guaranteed at least a dozen therapy sessions. The care would be delivered via VA’s video conferencing software.