Challenge
Connecting health care providers across large geographic areas was a challenge that the South Central U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) Health Care Network faced. Without the ability to interact and engage with each other, vital information was being lost and providers were not learning about opportunities and services that might help their patients.
Solution
An Atlas Research strategic communications team, in partnership with Booz Allen Hamilton, was brought in to address these challenges by developing the Rural Veterans Provider Network, an online community for health care providers across the Network, which covers 170,000 square miles and serves Veterans in Oklahoma, Arkansas, Louisiana, Mississippi, and parts of Texas, Missouri, Alabama, and Florida.
Result
This new resource facilitates interactions among providers both internal and external to VA, who serve rural Veterans in the south-central United States, and increases their ability to build a community of meaningful relationships based on shared values and priorities. It enables two-way communications and facilitates collaboration across the traditional barriers of geography, organization domain and hierarchy, and professional affinity. It also affords opportunities for providers to learn and build new skills, share successes and challenges, and offer and receive expertise on health-related issues.
The Provider Network is the first provider-based online community of its kind for VA; it is revolutionizing the way rural providers communicate and collaborate by linking more than 400 provider organizations and affiliations within the eight-state VISN 16 region.