Since 2019, Veterans Health Administration (VHA) Office of Healthcare Innovation and Learning has published the annual VHA State of Innovation (SOI) Report, highlighting notable VA innovations that are advancing the care delivery and experiences for Veterans. The 2024 VHA SOI Report is designed to educate and empower Veterans by sharing stories of innovative projects and programs relevant to their healthcare journeys—including Mission Daybreak.
With more than 9 million Veterans enrolled in VA care, VHA is the largest integrated healthcare system in the United States. Innovation has long been a cornerstone of VHA, from developing the first implantable cardiac pacemaker in 1960 and the first electronic health record in 1970, to being one of the first U.S. healthcare systems to adopt 5G and test use cases in 2020. VA has been at the forefront of innovative healthcare for decades.
Innovator teams take action
At the time of its launch in 2022, Mission Daybreak was the single largest U.S. Government open innovation prize since the establishment of the America COMPETES Act. The $20 million grand challenge received over 1,300 submissions, and a multidisciplinary panel of experts awarded $8.5 million to 40 teams during Phase 1 and $11.5 million to 10 winners in Phase 2. Following the challenge, the Mission Daybreak teams began the work to translate their ideas into action. Building off the efforts that began with the grand challenge, Mission Daybreak launched the Innovator Series in May 2024 to provide suicide prevention solution teams with access to a number of resources designed to promote a better understanding of VA and the Veteran population.
“There is an anchor of hope in the declining rate of suicide among Veterans with diagnoses of depression who have recently received VHA care. Every day, we are making a difference in everything we’re doing; we are saving lives.”
— Dr. Matthew Miller, Executive Director of VA’s Office of Suicide Prevention
Promising solutions are already beginning to make an impact for Veterans. The 2024 SOI Report features several Mission Daybreak solutions being implemented within VA:
- ReflexAI is providing crisis line responders with scalable scenario-practice experiences, one of the most critical and time-intensive parts of training new staff. In the first round of training, VCL responders showed a 40% improvement in performance across all simulations in certain critical areas, such as conducting a successful risk assessment.
- The first mental health community-based platform developed for American Indian and Alaska Native populations, Televeda is promoting healing to build resilience and reduce social isolation and loneliness. In May, the organization announced a partnership with Navajo Nation to expand its work.
- Through VA pilots, Early Alert is using Veterans’ responses to proactive, weekly check-ins via text to identify those in early distress and immediately activate VA and community support resources.
- Vara Safety is using its Mission Daybreak award to bring its smart gun safe from concept to reality, including collecting Veteran feedback, and recently identified a dedicated software partner for app development. The organization’s firearm safe integrates smart features to provide Veterans with more control over their firearm access.
Read the 2024 SOI Report and learn more about Mission Daybreak’s progress (page 29).
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