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VA WRIISC-DC—Veterans Affairs War-Related Illness and Injury Study Center in Washington, DC

While many combat veterans are healthy, the War Related Illness and Injury Study Centers were developed to address those subset of veterans who have deployment health questions or difficult to diagnosis illnesses or injuries. These centers evolved from the Gulf War Referral Centers that were developed by the VA in the 1990s to address the health concerns of Gulf War veterans. Following inquiries and recommendations from the Executive branch, Congress and other governmental and non-governmental agencies, legislation was enacted in 1998 that directed the VA to develop centers that specialized in all combat related illnesses and injuries regardless of conflict. In 2001, the VA approved two centers whose sole mission was to specialize in the study and treatment of war-related illnesses and injuries among combat veterans. After a competitive review process, the Washington DC VA and the East Orange VA were selected as the two sites for these centers. Initially these centers were titled the CSWRI (Center for the Study of War-Related Illnesses). Later, they were renamed the War-Related Illness and Injury Centers—WRIISC (pronounced "risk").

WRIISC-DC provides a second opinion for veterans with difficult-to-diagnose war-related illnesses and injuries. An evaluation at WRIISC-DC is appropriate for combat veterans with debilitating symptoms that remain unexplained after medical examinations by the local VA medical center. Combat veterans with medically unexplained illnesses may request a referral from their VA physician to our center. The evaluation is multidisciplinary and focuses on the particular problems of each veteran.

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