By Andy Leonatti

The House Veterans’ Affairs Health Subcommittee passed a bill Thursday expanding counseling for family members of veterans seeking care in the Department of Veterans’ Affairs (VA) health system.

The bill (H.R. 6439), sponsored by Rep. Phil Hare, D-Ill., was passed by the subcommittee by voice vote. The bill repeals a provision in current law that allows the VA to provide counseling and training to family members of veterans being given hospital care for non-combat related disabilities only when the counseling is essential to permitting the veteran’s discharge from the hospital.

Under current law, the VA provides mental-health counseling and training to family members of veterans receiving care for anything other than non-service connected disabilities, so long as the counseling and training are necessary to the veterans’ treatment.

Hare’s bill would place all veterans and their families, no matter the reason they are receiving care, at the same level of eligibility for receiving care, and allow family members to receive counseling services even if the veteran is not in the hospital.

Hare said his bill complements the VA’s transition from a primary in-patient caregiver to an outpatient, and increased family counseling and training would speed up recovery time.

VA Deputy Undersecretary for Health Gerald Cross said at a June 26 Health Subcommittee hearing that “as long as the family support services are necessary in connection with the veteran’s treatment, it should be irrelevant whether the disability under treatment is service-connected and whether it was provided in hospital.”