Patient Experience
Patient Advocates of the Lexington VA Health Care System are trained to assist Veterans and their families with issues regarding their care. If you have experienced any issues that you have not been able to resolve by speaking with your care team, please contact a Patient Advocate
Connect with a Patient Advocate
Care we provide at Lexington VA Health Care System
Lexington VA Health Care System (LVAHCS) is committed to an experience where care is delivered in a way that is smooth and easy for Veterans; we want to make your experience at our facilities easy & effective, but most importantly, we want to honor your service! They offer help with:
- Patient concerns with the care team
- Advocating for patient and family rights
The Patient Experience Office was established at Lexington in 2019 to oversee and assist the health care system in collaborations across VA sub-agencies, VHA program offices, and local health care community providers. The Patient Experience Officer leads, facilitates, and collaborates on patient experiences at the Lexington VA to improve efforts and initiatives.
The Patient Advocate program was specifically designed to manage the complaint and compliment process, including complaint resolution, data capture, and analysis of issues/complaints. They communicate this information to facility leadership to help drive system improvements. Patient Advocates assist front line staff in resolving issues that occur at the point of service and address complaints that were not able to be resolved at the point of service. Patient Advocates work directly with leadership to facilitate resolution to problems beyond the scope of front-line staff. Further, they participate in resolution of system problems by presenting the patient’s perspective of the problem and desired resolution.
Lexington VA uses a decentralized model for advocacy where Service Level Advocates (SLAs) are available within each department or clinical area to resolve concerns at the point-of-care. This model seeks to resolve patient issues at the lowest level possible.
Service Level Advocates (SLAs) are employees designated at the service level, or point of service, who assist in resolving issues after first attempts at resolution have been unsuccessful. An SLA resolves patient issues as a collateral duty, working in collaboration with the facility level Patient Advocate team to identify opportunities for improvement. All SLAs are granted access to enter data into the patient advocate tracking system – replacement (PATS-R).
If you or a Veteran you care for have not been able to resolve important issues related to the VA through other means of communication, please contact one of our highly skilled staff members who will be eager to help you in a timely manner.