GAO – Actions Needed to Assess Civilian Partnerships’ Contributions to Readiness
What GAO Found
The Department of Defense’s (DOD) decisions to partner with civilian medical facilities to train military medical personnel for the battlefield are influenced by various factors that can support or hinder the use of partnerships, according to officials. One type of partnership that DOD can establish through an external resource sharing agreement allows active-duty providers to provide medical care to beneficiaries in civilian medical facilities within DOD’s network. Using these partnerships can reduce costs by avoiding certain professional fees and by keeping patient care within the network. However, DOD has not fully explored the
benefits of increasing the use of these partnerships. Developing strategies to identify opportunities for using such agreements could ultimately help reduce costs, increase clinical readiness, and improve access to care.
What GAO Recommends
GAO is making nine recommendations, including that DOD develop strategies to identify opportunities for reducing costs while increasing readiness through partnerships established by external resource sharing agreements; develop processes to inventory partnerships; and fully assess the readiness contributions of its partnerships. DOD concurred with seven recommendations and partially concurred with two recommendations. GAO believes all recommendations are sound and should be fully addressed.