Increasing Veteran health care benefits enrollment
Emails to transitioning servicemembers about VA health care benefits did not affect enrollment
Patient in a wheelchair at a hospital
What was the challenge?
42% of Veterans who have never used VA health care were not aware of VA health care benefits; Concierge for Care aimed to address this knowledge gap by delivering messages specific to transitioning service members.
What was the program change?
OES and the VA’s Health Eligibility Center designed three emails to TSMs, sent 60 and 30 days pre-separation and 30 days post-separation. The email messages informed recipients of the availability of VA health benefits, summarized the eligibility requirements and the application process, and prompted them to consider enrolling.
How did the evaluation work?
From March to September 2017, 13,600 separating Servicemembers (for which VA has an email address) were randomly assigned to either receive a series of email notifications, or no emails at all. VA health benefit enrollment rates were tracked for those who received the emails, and compared to enrollment rates among TSMs who did not receive the emails.
What was the impact?
We did not observe any significant effect in enrollment for TSMs who received email information about VA health care benefits. Enrollment in VA health benefits was 10.7% among TSMs who did not receive emails, and 10.9% among TSMs who received the email series.
