Dive Brief:
- The backlog of disability claims in the Department of Veterans Affairs has dropped to its lowest level since record-keeping began eight years ago.
- The backlog of claims has fallen 84% since March 2013.
- A claim is classified as backlogged if it is more than 125 days old.
Dive Insight:
Here's some good news for an agency that hasn't had much of it for a while. Earlier this week, USA Today reported that thousands of critical positions in VA hospitals nationwide remain vacant despite recruitment efforts.
But this looks like real progress. The DVA places the credit on the increased use of EHRs and a more simple solution: brute force. The department has put more employees and overtime into the effort to shrink the backlog, and it appears to be paying off.
“We’ve watched it come down precipitously over the past year, and a lot of that has to do with mandatory overtime,” Garry Augustine, the executive director of Disabled American Veterans, told The Wall Street Journal.