Tag Archives: VA

The Veterans Health Administration, an agency within the Department of Veterans Affairs, is implementing the use of 3D printing in medical activities, Nextgov reported Wednesday. Doctors at Puget Sound Medical Center leverage additive manufacturing to simulate surgeries. Meanwhile, doctors from other hospitals use the technology to produce customized braces.

The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to integrate its acquisition and financial management systems to improve how the agency buys technologies as part of its ongoing modernization program, Government CIO Media & Research reported Monday. “Longstanding in VA, we've not had an integrated acquisition and finance solution,” said Terry Riffel, deputy assistant secretary of financial management business transformation at VA.

James Byrne, general counsel and acting deputy secretary of the Department of Veterans Affairs, was nominated to fill his role on a full-time basis. He held executive positions at Lockheed Martin and brings more than 25 years of public sector leadership experience, the White House said Friday.

James Gfrerer, the Department of Veterans Affairs chief information officer, said during the recent ACT-IAC Health Innovation Summit that the department intends to migrate 350 applications to the cloud by 2024, Fedscoop reported Wednesday. Gfrerer noted that the number of current and new applications to move to a cloud environment comprises half of the department’s portfolio.

Government officials discussed the challenges to federal health care innovation during an event hosted by the American Council for Technology - Industry Advisory Council, Nextgov reported Wednesday. Terry Adirim, deputy assistant secretary for health services policy and oversight at the Department of Defense, cited poor change management and slow procurement process as obstacles to innovative projects.

The Department of Veterans Affairs plans to boost contractual partnerships with veteran-owned and service-disabled, veteran-owned small businesses. The VA said Monday it aims to provide 17 percent of its contracts to businesses owned by veterans while 15 percent will be allocated to service-disabled veteran-owned businesses in a move to reinforce its contracting goals by five percent.

House lawmakers questioned the Department of Veterans Affairs about why the agency continued to increase spending for legacy technology systems despite the need for updated systems, Federal News Network reported Tuesday.

Unisys announced multiple contracts valued up to $252 million from the U.S. Census Bureau, the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC), the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) and the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) on Thursday.  

The Department of Homeland Security is using new workforce staffing models to address challenges in aligning operations with employment needs, Federal News Network reported Monday.

The Office of Inspector General found that the Veterans Benefits Administration failed to update its system for processing housing stipends under the Forever GI Bill, according to a Department of Veterans Affairs report released Wednesday.