Letter to the editor: VA Pittsburgh proud to serve veterans

I am proud to report VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System is the provider of choice for more than 63,000 veterans in our region. Our providers and staff work hard to maintain veterans’ trust, using advanced technology to deliver the best care, often with shorter wait times than veterans see in the private sector.

To best meet veterans’ health care needs, we provide a wide array of services and specialties at our two medical centers and five outpatient clinics. In fiscal year 2020, we served 72,647 unique veterans. As one of the first health care entities in the region to adopt telehealth, we saw a 42% increase from 2019 in the number of telehealth visits provided.

Many of our doctors, nurses and support staff train to respond to natural and community disasters through VA’s voluntary Disaster Emergency Medical Personnel System. That training proved invaluable during the pandemic, with 51 employees deploying in the past year to hot spots across the country.

Closer to home, we continue to provide veterans access to the covid-19 vaccine quickly and efficiently. As of March 18, we had given more than 33,000 doses to veterans who receive health care with us. Of those, more than 14,500 are already fully inoculated. More than 3,200 employees are fully vaccinated. On March 19, we celebrated the administration of our 40,000th dose.

Veterans have earned the very best our nation can provide, and we at VA Pittsburgh are honored to provide them with the care they deserve.

Donald E. Koenig

Oakland

The writer is director of the VA Pittsburgh Healthcare System.