U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) deputy secretary, Donald Remy, sought to alleviate concerns among Bronx veterans amid news of possible closures of the Brooklyn and Manhattan VA medical centers in the future, during a recent visit to the Bronx VA medical center on Friday, April 8. The visit was organized in the context of the VA’s ongoing Asset and Infrastructure Review (AIR), a study of the current and future health care needs of veterans across the country in the context of existing VA medical service provision.

 

Though no date has yet been set for the potential closures in Brooklyn and Manhattan, the news has, nonetheless and as reported, caused some Bronx veterans to question the impact such closures may have on the Bronx VA facility.

 

Located at 130 West Kingsbridge Road in Fordham Manor, the James J. Peters Department of Veterans Affairs Medical Center is a tertiary care facility, serving some of the 210,000 local U.S. veterans (as of 2021) in New York City and beyond. Tertiary care means highly specialized medical care, usually provided over an extended period of time and involves advanced and complex procedures and treatments performed by medical specialists in state-of-the-art facilities.

 

The Bronx VA facility is also a teaching hospital providing a full range of patient care services, with state-of-the-art technology. VA officials say it is the top performing VA center for research in the region, and that comprehensive health care is provided through primary care, tertiary care, and long-term care in areas of medicine, general and specialty surgery, psychiatry, physical medicine and rehabilitation, neurology, oncology, dentistry, geriatrics, and extended care.

 

During his remarks, Remy said he wanted to visit The Bronx facility to hear what was on the minds of the staff both in terms of the opportunities they saw at the center and also the challenges they faced in serving veterans.

 

“I learned about our robotics program that helps our veterans who have spinal injuries, get up and walking, those who might have limited mobility, those who are paralyzed altogether, and the equipment that helps them have a better life through being able to be mobile, and to engage in the fashion that they have in the past,” Remy told those gathered.

The center is part of VA Network 2, which includes facilities in Manhattan, Brooklyn, Castle Point and Montrose (Hudson Valley), Northport (Long Island), St. Albans (Queens), New York, and East Orange and Lyons in New Jersey. The center’s acting director, Rosemary Cancel-Santiago, accompanied Remy, among others, on the tour of The Bronx campus, where the brief press conference was held in front of the Fisher House building.

 

The deputy secretary added that he also talked a lot with the Bronx VA center teams about mental health services. “We have one of the greatest mental health capacities here in The Bronx, at this medical center,” he said. “Utilizing the services and expertise available here……the focus on mental health is fantastic.”

 

In reference to the AIR commission process specifically, which he equated to a market assessment, he said, “One thing that’s important for people to understand is we don’t plan on leaving any market.”  He added, “There are lots of people that have suggested that the air commission recommendations will result in the abandonment of any particular market [serving veterans]. That’s not the case.”

 

Remy said the AIR’s mission was to try to make sure the VA was best positioned, together with the community, to provide the services that veterans needed and how it could best deliver those services to the VA communities that needed them the most. “This is just the beginning,” he added. “These are recommendations that are being made to a commission,” he said, adding that the commission would then assemble, take the recommendations, analyze them, hold public meetings, and ultimately make determinations as to what they’ll recommend to the president.

 

“Then, the President will make determinations that have to go to the Congress, so we’re a long way away from any changes being made,” Remy said. In terms of his visit highlights, he said, “What I’ve seen in many of our medical centers is an acute attention to our women veterans. Our women veterans are our largest growing group of our veteran population, and we need to make sure that any veterans, especially our women veterans, feel welcome, they have the services that they need… I see that here in the Bronx, and I’ve seen them around the country.”

 

Asked what local veterans could expect were the takeaways from his visit, Remy said, “I’ve heard a lot here. I’ll take some of that back.” He vowed to stay in touch with the Bronx VA’s local management team about the needs of the center and how the federal VA department could address those needs. “We talked a lot about staffing and resources and making sure that we have the people available to provide the services to vets, and how we can help make that happen,” he said.

 

Asked what message he had for those veterans who felt they were being abandoned in the context of the potential closures and likely amalgamation of services, Remy said, “We’re not abandoning anything. Anybody who has served this nation is more than eligible, and more than welcome to be served by the VA in any community across the country.”

Remy was then asked directly about the future viability of the Bronx VA facility. He said, “This is a medical center that is designed to provide services for our veterans. I’m sure that your viewers or listeners have looked at the AIR commission recommendations. We may realign some of the services here, but our VA medical center here in The Bronx will continue to provide service to our community.”

 

The deputy secretary was then asked what structural and personnel changes local veterans could expect to see when it comes to potentially serving incoming veterans from outside the region [due to possible closures in Brooklyn and Manhattan] while continuing to serve veterans returning from active service.

 

He referred the question to Cancel-Santiago to answer, who said, “We currently have concurrent construction projects to upgrade and modernize our infrastructure to [inaudible] the facility, to receive additional veterans and enhance services that we provide, and we’re going to partner with our academic affiliates to ensure that we attract the highest…specialty care services, to provide to veterans based on demand, including women veterans.”

She added, “In addition to that, we offer really healthy recruitment and retention benefit packages for nurses. We’ve just established a nursing residency program, and we are proud to say that we are and will be ready to accept physician veterans at all levels in the future.”

 

Finally, Remy was asked if changes were to be made in the future to The Bronx facility, and if veterans were referred to other locations, would the medical staff at such locations be trained in dealing with veterans, specifically. He said, “As I said before, we’re going to make sure that our veterans can receive the service they…[inaudible],” he said. Now, it may be the case that, sometimes, that service is offered somewhere else, but we’ll make sure that that’s available, whether it’s in the community, or it’s here in The Bronx VA or some other facility to ensure the services that they need will be provided.”