Dive Brief:
- The Department of Veterans Affairs announced plans to launch a new portal called Vets.gov to consolidate 1,000 websites into a central hub.
- The portal will go live Veterans Day, Nov. 11, but will take up to a year to be fully operational.
- Vets.gov will serve as an all-inclusive resource to perform user services including: adding dependents, checking claims, changing addresses and signing up for education benefits, according to iHealthBeat.
Dive Insight:
Tom Allin, the VA's chief veterans experience officer, said the VA's 225 health system databases "don't talk to each other" and "have different data rules and so, we can't tell you who is actually using VA today among our veterans."
He added the VA has to improve customer data collection efforts, including data on veterans' contact information, use of VA services, demographics and military records.