The Department of Veterans Affairs has taken action to provide language access services and "culturally appropriate" care to an increasingly diverse veterans population, GAO has said.
VA reported that as of June 2007, all of its medical centers had taken action to implement the guidance in VA’s "limited English proficiency" directive, according to GAO-08-535.
It said that specifically, medical center officials told VA that they had assessed the language needs of their veteran service populations, and, where necessary, developed language assistance policies and offered language access services, including providing translated materials and interpretation services.
The VA medical centers GAO reviewed provided translated materials to meet various language needs and offered interpretation services as well through bi-lingual staff.
Five of the six VA medical centers GAO reviewed can access telephone interpretation services that are provided through a contract to help ensure that medical staff can communicate with veterans and their families with limited proficiency, said GAO.
Medical center officials have said that while demand for language services is low, they expect it to increase.
GAO also said three VA facilities it reviewed offer spiritual services, such as the use of medicine men and traditional healing rituals, in order to meet the needs of Native American veterans.
The department also has minority veterans program coordinators at each medical center to identify barriers to health care for minorities and advise medical center officials, according to the report.
