New Mexico
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 600,000 used GI Bill education benefits and more than 2.4 million owned homes purchased with GI Bill home loan benefits originally valued at $236 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 $745 million in New Mexico in 2006 to serve more than 175,000 veterans who live in the state.  That same year, 34,511 veterans and survivors received disability compensation, dependency and indemnity compensation, or pension payments in New Mexico.  VA provided 4,978 veterans, reservists or survivors education benefits through the GI Bill; 23,001 owned homes with active VA home loan guarantees originally valued at $786 million.  New Mexico veterans held nearly 12,000 VA life insurance policies worth $133 million.  In 2006, 1,691 were interred in Ft. Bayard and Santa Fe national cemeteries.

• Health Care:  One of the most visible of all VA benefits is health care.  VA has 153 hospitals, 895 ambulatory care and community-based outpatient clinics, 209 Vet Centers, 135 nursing homes, 47 residential rehabilitation treatment programs and 92 comprehensive home care programs.  To improve patients’ ability to access care, 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 New Mexico, VA operates a major medical center in Albuquerque and a system of community-based outpatient clinics throughout the state.  Reflecting a national trend in health care, inpatient admissions decreased in 2006, to 6,290; outpatient visits were up – to 536,517.  New Mexico is on the cutting edge of improving access to health care for patients living in rural areas.  In 1987, the first outpatient clinic was opened in Farmington, followed by VA-staffed clinics in Artesia, Gallup, Raton, Silver City and Santa Fe.  Recognizing the difficulties in staffing rural clinics, VA contracts for care in Alamogordo, Clovis, Española, Hobbs, Las Cruces, Las Vegas, Truth or Consequences and Durango, Colorado.

State-of-the-art care is provided at the Albuquerque medical center as reflected in its recent innovative treatment for abdominal aortic aneurysm and the addition of PET scan capability.  The medical center is one of a handful of facilities across the nation that has magnetoencephalography (MEG), a revolutionary advance in brain imaging.  In addition, the 26-bed Spinal Cord Injury Center provides a full range of rehabilitative and primary care services to veterans suffering from spinal cord injury.  The Albuquerque medical center has a sharing agreement with the 377th Medical Group at Kirtland Air Force Base, which is co-located with the VA facility.  The Albuquerque VA Medical Center also maintains a major affiliation with the University of New Mexico School of Medicine.

• 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 New Mexico, more than 2,000 active duty service members and veterans of the Global War on Terror sought VA health care in 2006.  Many veterans from the conflict in Iraq and Afghanistan have visited VA counseling centers in Albuquerque, Farmington and Santa Fe.  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 New Mexico, more than 21,000 veterans 65 years and older received medical care from VA in 2006.  A wide range of geriatric, rehabilitative and extended care services are available and programs continue to expand to meet the growing needs of this elderly population.  The geriatrics and extended care program was redesigned to emphasize an inter-disciplinary team approach that is better able to meet the needs of patients requiring palliative and respite care.

The medical center has a variety of contracts that allow placement of veterans requiring skilled nursing care in long-term care facilities closer to their homes and families as well as providing home health nurses who enable veterans to remain in their homes for as long as possible.  The primary focus of these programs is rehabilitative and restorative treatment to assist veterans to reach their optimum level of functioning.

• 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.

VA research programs in New Mexico are multidisciplinary.  Research investigators conduct more than a hundred separate research projects with a research budget in excess of $15 million. Research projects include work in cardiology, neurology, endocrinology, neuropsychiatry, gastroenterology, psychiatry, pulmonary disease, rehabilitation medicine, psychology and infectious disease.  The cooperative studies program’s clinical research pharmacy coordinating center and the center for clinical application for magnetoencephalography are two nationally recognized programs.

• 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 Albuquerque Regional Office serves veterans and their survivors in New Mexico who are seeking VA financial benefits.  In fiscal year 2006, the Albuquerque Regional Office processed 5,784 disability compensation claims, including 1,519 veterans applying for the first time and 4,265 cases where veterans reopened a claim, usually to seek an increase in their disability rating level for higher payments.  More than a thousand New Mexico 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.

New Mexico VA has a variety of programs for homeless veterans.  With assistance from a three-year grant, VA has partnered with Albuquerque’s Health Care for the Homeless Project to offer an innovative program to assist homeless veterans.  Known as the Veterans Outreach Program, it represents a unique effort to serve the physical and mental health care needs of the veteran homeless population.  In addition, the program provides mental health, primary care, substance abuse treatment, vocational rehabilitation services, as well as liaison and case management services.  The grant also funds an outreach coordinator responsible for overseeing residential placement of homeless veterans.  VA representatives participate in several stand downs to assist homeless veterans each year, providing clothing, health care and counseling services.  They also work closely with community organizations dedicated to providing assistance to homeless veterans.

• 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 two national cemeteries in New Mexico.  Santa Fe National Cemetery had 1,583 burials in 2006 and Ft. Bayard National Cemetery had 108 burials.  The state is designing a veterans cemetery at Ft. Stanton for which it will seek a VA grant.  VA provided 2,765 headstones and markers for the graves of veterans in New Mexico and sent 1,657 Presidential Memorial Certificates to New Mexico survivors of veterans.