Last week, U.S. Rep. Charlie Crist, D-Fla., brought out the “Improving Specialty Care for Women Veterans Act.”
The bill will help “recruit and train specialty healthcare providers at the VA and in the community who understand the unique health needs of women veterans” and ‘allows women veterans seeking specialty care to choose a doctor that meets their needs and has training in gender-specific care, including a doctor who is a woman.”
Crist’s office offered some of the reasons behind his proposal.
“Currently, the VA provides gender-specific care for primary care, mental healthcare, military sexual trauma, and reproductive health, including the ability to see providers who themselves are women. However, women veterans may not have the option of gender-specific care when seeing providers in other specialties, even though they face the same sensitive health needs as in specialties where gender-specific care is already offered,” Crist’s office noted.
“Like all veterans, women veterans suffer from the seen and unseen wounds of war – wounds that require specialized, high-quality VA healthcare. But not enough women can access gender-specific care at the VA,” said Crist. “By expanding the specialties that offer gender-specific care, hiring and training more women doctors and nurses who understand the needs of women veterans, we can provide our women veterans with the level of care they deserve and have earned in defense of our nation.”
The bill was sent to the U.S. House Veterans Affairs Committee. So far, there is no companion bill over in the U.S. Senate. Crist has yet to reel in any co-sponsors.
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