Sponsors (2)
The bill expands veterans' access to and coordination of care by leveraging DoD medical capacity and tighter DoD–VA integration, but it brings added costs, implementation and security burdens, and short-term access and planning uncertainties due to transitional procedures and a temporary sunset.
Veterans in areas with underused military treatment facilities gain increased access to timely care when DoD capacity is used to serve them.
Veterans and health systems will have easier sharing of medical records and billing information, reducing duplicate tests and improving care coordination across VA and DoD.
Healthcare workers and patients with complex or chronic conditions benefit from more cross-credentialed clinicians and expanded graduate medical education, increasing clinician availability and experience.
Taxpayers and health systems may face increased costs for IT integration, billing coordination, and administration to enable DoD facilities to serve veterans.
Veterans could experience delays or reduced short-term access to some providers if the VA suspends referrals to investigate quality concerns.
Implementation will require heavy coordination across agencies and local commanders, which could slow deployment and lead to uneven application across facilities.
Based on analysis of 2 sections of legislative text.
Requires DoD and VA to create approved joint action plans to share medical capacity, integrate IT/administration, cross-credential clinicians, and expand GME to improve veteran access.
Official title: To direct the Secretary of Defense and the Secretary of Veterans Affairs to improve the availability of care for veterans at facilities of the Department of Defense.
Introduced December 10, 2025 by Derek Schmidt · Last progress December 10, 2025
Requires the Secretaries of Defense and Veterans Affairs to create and implement coordinated action plans at identified military or VA medical facilities so those sites can share resources, increase use of military medical capacity, expand graduate medical education (GME) training, and improve access to care for enrolled veterans. Plans must address clinician cross-credentialing and privileging, expedited VA and veteran access to DoD installations, IT and administrative integration for records/referrals/billing, oversight of adverse events, a designated facility coordinator, performance goals, and data collection—subject to local commander, VA director, and VA–DOD Joint Executive Committee approval before submission to Congress. The requirement directs the departments to prioritize using excess DoD medical capacity to treat enrolled veterans and grow training opportunities for DoD and VA clinicians, while establishing accountability measures and information-sharing systems to support joint clinical operations and track outcomes over time.