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A bill to help fight veteran suicide is being considered by the US House.
The IMPROVE Well-Being For Veterans Act was co-introduced by Congressman Jack Bergman Wednesday.
IMPROVE stands for Incorporating Measurements and Providing Resources for Outreach.
The bill is intended to fundamentally enhance coordination and planning of Veteran mental health and suicide prevention services and would develop measurement tools to track the effectiveness of these community-level programs.
“Despite significant VA funding increases for Veteran mental health and suicide prevention over the past 15 years, the number of Veteran suicides per year has remained virtually unchanged. The bipartisan IMPROVE Well-Being for Veterans Act would allow the VA to provide grant funding to nonprofits and local organizations who can supply outreach and a range of services to at-risk Veterans. Preventing Veteran suicide takes a community, and the IMPROVE Act will put forth a new framework for the VA and those nationwide network of organizations to work together and deliver outcomes that benefit our Veterans,” said Bergman.
The IMPROVE Act will enable the VA to directly or indirectly reach more Veterans than it currently does; increase coordination among currently disparate community resources that serve a wide variety of Veteran needs – all of which play a part in reducing the feeling of purposelessness that ends in suicide; and create and inspire broad adoption of a measurement tool that will indicate effectiveness of services provided for Veterans suicide prevention
A companion bill was introduced in the US Senate last week.
