Louisiana
and the
U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs

• General: The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) offers a wide variety of programs and services for the nation’s 24.3 million veterans.  In 2006, about 5.3 million people were treated in VA health care facilities, 3.6 million veterans and survivors received VA disability compensation or pensions, nearly 500,000 used GI Bill education benefits and more than 2.2 million owned homes purchased with GI Bill home loan benefits originally valued at $240 billion.  About 97,000 veterans and family members were buried in VA’s national cemeteries and 335,000 headstones and markers were provided for veterans’ graves worldwide.

VA spent nearly $1.2 billion in Louisiana in 2006 to serve more than 356,000 veterans who live in the state.  That same year, 58,114 veterans and survivors received disability compensation, dependency and indemnity compensation, or pension payments in Louisiana.  VA provided 8,246 veterans, reservists or survivors education benefits through the GI Bill; 34,342 owned homes with active VA home loan guarantees originally valued at $3 billion.  Louisiana veterans held more than 17,000 VA life insurance policies worth $198 million.  In 2006, 515 were interred in Louisiana’s three national cemeteries.

• Health Care:  One of the most visible of all VA benefits is health care.  VA has 153 hospitals, 881 ambulatory care and community-based outpatient clinics, 207 Vet Centers, 136 nursing homes, 45 residential rehabilitation treatment programs and 92 comprehensive home care programs.  Due to technology and national and VA health care trends, VA has changed from a hospital-based system to a primarily outpatient-focused system over the past decade.  Veterans will make 55 million outpatient visits to VA health care facilities this year.

In Louisiana, VA operates three major medical centers in Alexandria, New Orleans and Shreveport.  The Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care System, which includes the former New Orleans VA Medical Center, is recovering from flooding and other damage that occurred during Hurricane Katrina.  The Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care System has developed a system of clinics to provide outpatient care, including specialty services, to veterans in southeast Louisiana.  Inpatient services are coordinated through both local community hospitals and other VA facilities.  Work is also underway to rebuild a medical center in the greater New Orleans area.

The Alexandria medical center provides a 334-bed acute care and nursing home facility.  Employing more than 900 health care professionals, Alexandria specializes in long-term care, psychiatric care and primary care.  The medical center also operates outpatient clinics in Jennings and Lafayette, serving veterans in the Lake Charles and Lafayette areas.

The Shreveport medical center provides 112 beds for care in medicine, surgery, neurology and psychiatry, plus a broad spectrum of primary and specialized outpatient and ambulatory care services.  The facility conducts emergency inpatient psychiatric care for Barksdale Air Force Base and pre-discharge physicals for active duty personnel.  The Shreveport medical center is affiliated with Louisiana State University School of Medicine, providing an important training site for residents and medical students.  Other academic training affiliations include nursing, pharmacy, social work, respiratory therapy and numerous other health and health-related fields.  The Shreveport medical center employs more than 1,102 health care professionals.  The center also provides convenient access to care for more than 15,000 veterans at community-based outpatient clinics in Monroe, La., and Longview, Texas, and Texarkana, Ark.

• Post-Conflict Care:  VA has launched special efforts to provide a "seamless transition" for those returning from service in Operations Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom (OIF/OEF).  Each VA medical facility and benefits regional office has a point of contact to coordinate activities locally to help meet the needs of these returning combat service members and veterans.  In addition, VA increased the staffing of benefits counselors at key military hospitals where severely wounded service members from Iraq and Afghanistan are frequently sent.  Once home, recent Iraq and Afghan veterans have ready access to VA health care, which is free of charge for two years following separation for any health problem possibly related to wartime service.  Some 205,000 veterans from the Global War on Terror have sought VA health care since returning stateside, about one-third of the total number of men and women leaving military service.

In Louisiana, more than a thousand active duty service members and veterans of the Global War on Terror have sought VA health care.  Many veterans from the conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan have visited VA counseling centers in Kenner and Shreveport.  These community-based Vet Centers serve as an important resource for veterans who, once home, often seek out fellow veterans for advice or help transitioning back to civilian life.

• Geriatric Care:  Long-term care is a critical issue for America’s veterans.  Approximately 39 percent of living veterans are at least 65 years, compared with 12 percent of the general population.  The challenge to care for these 9.5 million men and women is met through a spectrum of home and community-based programs such as home-based primary care, homemaker and home health aide services, home respite and hospice and adult day care health.  VA also provides home and domiciliary care for veterans who can no longer be safely maintained in non-institutional settings.  Additionally, VA conducts nationwide research on the causes and treatment of Alzheimer’s disease and other dementias and funds 21 geriatric research, education and clinical centers, each focusing on a major geriatric problem.

In Louisiana, nearly 46,000 veterans aged 65 or older received health care from VA last year.  Before Hurricane Katrina struck, the New Orleans medical center offered extended care services, which include a geriatric evaluation clinic, home-based primary care and the Lindy C. Boggs Transitional Care Unit, which offers extensive rehabilitative and restorative care.  The Shreveport medical center supports the War Veterans Home in Monroe and is planning a War Veterans Home in the Shreveport-Bossier City area.  The medical center also supports the home-based primary care, homemaker-health aide program and the respite program and is affiliated with the Caddo Council on Aging Program.

The Alexandria VA Medical Center provides extended care services to in-patients in the intermediate care and geriatric evaluation units and residents in the nursing home care units.  Services are also provided to outpatients through contractual and referral programs such as community nursing homes, community adult day care, community home health and homemaker and home health aide programs.

• Research:  To provide the highest quality of health care to the nation’s veterans, VA sponsors a world-renowned research and development program that addresses some of the most difficult challenges facing medical science today, such as aging, vision loss, women’s health, Gulf War illnesses, diabetes, bioterrorism and hepatitis. VA researchers led the way in developing the cardiac pacemaker, the CT scan, magnetic source imaging and improving artificial limbs.  More recently, injuries sustained by armed forces engaged in current deployments have further increased the long-standing emphasis on VA research on limb loss; prosthetics and tissue replacement; traumatic brain injury; spinal cord injury; and mental health issues including post-traumatic stress disorder.  The quality of the research and relevance to the veteran population remain the determining factors in deciding what studies to fund.

The Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care System in New Orleans has a well-funded research and development program, including studies in such diverse areas as hypertension, heart disease, kidney disease, schizophrenia, PTSD, Alzheimer's disease, and more, all of which enhance VA’s ability to provide state-of-the-art medical techniques and treatments to veterans.

Currently, there are 18 active research principal investigators and 38 active research projects at the Southeast Louisiana Veterans Health Care System.

• Disabilities and Pensions:  Not all military service related issues end when people are discharged from active duty.  About 2.7 million veterans receive monthly VA disability compensation for medical conditions related to their service in uniform.  VA pensions go to about 330,000 wartime veterans with limited means.  Family members of about 527,000 veterans qualify for monthly VA payments as the survivors of disabled veterans or pension recipients.

VA's New Orleans Regional Office serves veterans and their survivors in Louisiana who are seeking VA financial benefits.  In fiscal year 2006, the New Orleans Regional Office processed 7,997 disability compensation claims, including 2,438 veterans applying for the first time and 5,559 cases where veterans reopened a claim, usually to seek an increase in their disability rating level for higher payments.  More than 1,200 Louisiana veterans participated in VA’s Vocational Rehabilitation and Employment program in 2006.

• Homeless:  Nearly one-quarter of all homeless adults are veterans, and many more veterans who live in poverty are at risk of becoming homeless.  VA is the only federal agency that provides substantial hands-on assistance directly to the homeless.  It has the largest network of homeless assistance programs in the country.  More than 15,000 residential rehabilitative, transitional and permanent beds are available for homeless veterans throughout the country.  VA aggressively reaches out to veterans on the street, conducts clinical assessments, offers needed medical treatment, and provides long-term shelters and job training.  More than $265 million is dedicated to specialized homeless programs to assist homeless veterans, including grants and per diem payments to more than 400 public and non-profit groups.

VA homeless programs in Louisiana are based in Alexandria, Shreveport and New Orleans.  In all three cities, non-profit organizations were awarded VA grants and per diem payments to establish transitional housing and provide other benefits for homeless veterans.

The Shreveport medical center participates in Operation Stand Down, which provides services to more than a hundred homeless veterans.  Several aggressive outreach initiatives were used to reach veterans not already in the system.  Operation Stand Down is tied into the community through the Community Homeless Coalition.  The street outreach for homeless veterans has expanded and Shreveport is affiliated with the local “Hope for Homeless” coalition.

The Alexandria Healthcare for Homeless Veterans Program provides outreach, physical and psychiatric exams, treatment, referrals and ongoing case management to veterans in central and southwest Louisiana.

• Memorial Affairs:  Most men and women who have been in the military are eligible for burial in a national cemetery, as are their dependent children and usually their spouses.  VA manages the country’s network of national cemeteries with more than 2.7 million gravesites at 125 national cemeteries in 39 states and Puerto Rico, as well as in 33 soldier’s lots and monument sites.  In 2006, nearly 97,000 veterans were buried in VA's national cemeteries.  Additionally, VA provided more than 335,000 headstones and markers and 405,000 Presidential Memorial Certificates to the loved ones of deceased veterans.  VA-assisted state veterans cemeteries provided more than 22,000 interments.

VA has three national cemeteries in Louisiana.  Port Hudson National Cemetery in Zachary had 456 burials in 2006.  Alexandria National Cemetery in Pineville, and Baton Rouge National Cemetery bury eligible family members and cremation remains.  Alexandria had 51 burials and Baton Rouge had 8.  Louisiana is building a state veterans cemetery in Shreveport.  VA provided 5,069 headstones and markers for the graves of veterans in Louisiana and 2,183 Presidential Memorial Certificates to their loved ones.

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