VA Office of Rural Health Funding Programs

rural.health.inquiry@va.gov
202.632.8615

The VA Office of Rural Health provides funding, technical assistance, and mentoring for rural VA facilities. Funding is available for VA applicants to implement two types of programs that support rural Veterans' health and well-being:

• Rural promising practices are practices that have gone through a rigorous review and show significant impact, based on specific criteria:
  • Increased access
  • Strong partnerships
  • Clinical impact
  • Return on investment
  • Operational feasibility
  • Customer satisfaction
• Enterprise wide initiatives use telehealth and other technologies to expand national VA programs to sites that serve rural veterans in the areas of:
  • Primary care
  • Specialty care
  • Mental health
  • Workforce training and education
  • Care coordination
  • Health IT modernization
  • Research
  • Innovation
  • Transportation

Applications are only accepted from facilities within the VA to fund VA staff and programs.

Based on the Rural Promising Practices, the VA Office of Rural Health encourages facilities to partner with local organizations and agencies, using VA funding to multiply the impact of programs and services.

To support the adoption of the Rural Promising Practices, VA staff provide mentored implementation to help new sites establish programs through training, supporting documents, ongoing technical consultation, and initial seed funding.

Initial funding is available to support implementation of Enterprise Wide Initiatives in VA facilities across the country.

Award amounts vary. Initial funding allows VA facilities to accumulate workload for up to 3 years so that programs may be sustained with annual VA workload allocations.

Contact the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs Office of Rural Health to discuss potential projects and funding options.