What is a VA hospital?

Valerie Salva, BSN, RN · Dec 16, 2007

VA hospitals only treat US military service veterans.

You must be a US citizen to work for the US gov't. VA employees are US gov't employees.

Kyrshamarks, BSN, RN · Dec 17, 2007

You do not need to be a US citizen to work for the US government

salwalwol · Dec 17, 2007

I have worked for the VA. When I was hired, you had to be a citizen. But I recently worked with a RN from Canada. She was married to a U.S soldier and had her citizenship papers pending.

Look on the VA web site for information on hiring requirements.

http://www.va.gov

Bopeepinwv · Dec 17, 2007

I am currently working for the VA hospital in Huntington, WV. We treat Veterans and actually some spouses of veterans. The benefits are pretty good here. I can retire after 20 years of service, and I receive 8hrs vacation and 4 hrs sick leave every two weeks.

Of course as with every other hospital there are down sides. We work short staffed alot, and get mandated to stay over working extra hours.

Also I am considered a federal employee, which is kinda cool. :lol2:

Daytonite, BSN, RN · Dec 17, 2007

i worked in a va hospital for 5 years. they are federally owned and operated facilities. to qualify as a patient you must have been in military service to the u.s. government, or in some cases, the spouse or family member of a military member. their illness, in many cases, is supposed to be related to their military service in some way, although not having any other medical insurance, i think, will also qualify a veteran for va healthcare. the application process to work at a va hospital, however, takes patience and you will have to undergo an fbi investigation, all do. you must be legally able to work in the u.s. to work there. if you have a green card and are a legal resident of the u.s., you can work there. as a nurse you only need to have a license in any one of the u.s. states, not necessarily the one in which the v.a. is located. the actual land that the v.a. hospital sits on is considered federal land, not state land. so, when you are at a v.a. hospital you are under federal laws and federal protection. you are placed in a salary grade and raises are done automatically along with everyone else in the facility, so it is done fairly.

as an employee of a va facility you are a federal employee with most of the benefits, excellent benefits, and there are a good many more than you get working for private facilities. many people love working for the federal government for this reason and stay at these jobs because of that. i recall working with people who had unbelievable accumulations of vacation and sick time. you will find people who have worked for 20 and 30 years at the va hospitals. many were corpsman or nurses in the military themselves. also, i never worked with so many male nurses and orderlies in my life! there was never a problem finding lifting help.

va hospitals are of many different types. beside having general medical units, most specialize in particular types of care, i.e. orthopedic surgery, neurosurgery, cardiac surgery, alcohol and drug abuse treatment, psychiatric care, residential care (ltc care). the one i worked at specialized in orthopedic, neurosurgery and psychiatric care. if we had a patient that needed open heart surgery, the patient was transferred to another va hospital that did that type of surgery--the transfer was done by the va. i know there is a huge va facility in the midwest that is strictly for psychiatric patients only. there is another that is for drug and alcohol abuse treatment only. the vas provide many services for the veterans and many va hospitals are huge centers that provide a variety of services, including outpatient care, beside just being acute hospitals or residential centers. my facility also had a unit that provided overnight beds for homeless vets.

you also need to know that the va system is one of the largest researchers in this country. many of the doctors who are actually on staff with the va are research doctors who spend most of their time doing research. the majority of doctors who are actually treating the patients are residents from local medical schools who are working under the supervision of these researchers as they are rotated through. so, the doctors are pretty much changing all the time, except for the research staff doctors.