**GAO-11-219**                      Published: Feb 28, 2011. Publicly Released: Feb 28, 2011.                  

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## Highlights

The Defense Centers of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury (DCOE) was established to lead DOD's effort to develop excellence in DOD prevention, outreach, and care for those with psychological health and traumatic brain injury conditions. GAO was asked to report on (1) challenges DCOE has faced in its development; (2) the extent to which DCOE's strategic plan aligns with key practices used by leading public-sector organizations; and (3) the extent to which internal controls provide reasonable assurance that DCOE information on financial obligations is reliable for management decision making. GAO reviewed documentation and interviewed DCOE officials about DCOE development challenges, evaluated DCOE's strategic plan against practices used by leading public-sector organizations, assessed the design of internal controls for recording obligations, and tested fiscal year 2009 DCOE obligations to supporting documentation to determine if the obligations were properly classified.

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