As Secretary, my bottom line will be access to quality healthcare for veterans. This will be particularly true for veterans who do not have other options, either because they need the specialized services provided by VA or because their circumstances call on them to look to VA as their only healthcare provider. President-elect Bush has promised a top to bottom review of VA's healthcare system, implementation of the Millennium Health Care Act, and modernization of barriers hindering veterans' access to health care. New technology offers VA new opportunities. It also imposes great challenges.
Technology is often expensive, and is almost always complex.
Effective application of complex technology to already complex processes, such as VA's, frequently requires rethinking and rebuilding from the ground up. Information technology can offer a means to break down the bureaucratic barriers that interfere with quick and efficient service to veterans as well as the walls dividing VA from her sister departments in the Federal government and, totally unacceptably to me, barriers within VA itself. VA has absorbed billions of dollars allocated to improving its ability to collect, process and communicate data. Frankly, I do not see improvements proportional to the resources consumed. I do not now have a solution for VA's information technology problems.