Article at a glance
- It’s coordinated care, a team of your GP and a care coordinator managing your conditions together.
- Gold Card holders with a chronic condition qualify; White Card holders need a chronic, DVA-accepted mental health condition.
- No cost to you. Your GP is funded to deliver and coordinate the care.
- It’s ongoing, you stay enrolled for as long as you’re benefiting, and your GP enrols you.
Managing a chronic condition after service can mean a stream of appointments, repeating your story to different providers, and trying to keep it all coordinated yourself. The DVA Coordinated Veterans’ Care (CVC) Program exists to take that weight off you, by building a care team around you instead.
This guide explains what the CVC Program is, who can access it, and how to get started. For the conditions it helps manage, see our DVA medical conditions hub.
What the CVC Program is
The Coordinated Veterans’ Care Program is a DVA program for veterans living with chronic or complex health conditions. Its aim is simple: to manage your conditions proactively so your health stays stable and you avoid unplanned trips to hospital. Rather than leaving you to juggle it all, it puts a coordinated team around you, working from a single plan built on your goals.
How it works
The program is built around a core care team: your usual GP and a care coordinator, who is usually a practice nurse. Your GP works with you to develop a comprehensive care plan covering your health goals and treatment needs, and oversees how that plan is delivered. The care coordinator handles the day-to-day, keeping your care on track and staying in regular contact with you, at least once a month. Your initial assessment and care plan are done face to face, at the practice or in your home, not over telehealth. As your needs change, the plan changes with them.
Who can access it
To take part, you need either:
- a Veteran Gold Card and one or more chronic health conditions, or
- a Veteran White Card and one or more chronic, DVA-accepted mental health conditions.
You also need to be an Australian resident living in the community, with complex care needs and at risk of unplanned hospitalisation. Some groups are not eligible, including White Card holders without an accepted mental health condition, permanent residents of an aged care facility, and people with a terminal condition not expected to live beyond 12 months.
Hold a White Card but your mental health condition isn’t accepted yet? You can still get treatment for any mental health condition through Non-Liability Health Care, but the CVC Program needs the condition to be formally accepted as service-related. If it should be accepted and isn’t, that’s a claim, and it’s worth getting it lodged and supported properly. Our team can help with that.
What it costs
The CVC Program coordinates all of your health conditions at no cost to you. Your GP is funded for delivering and coordinating your care through the program. One thing worth understanding: enrolment is about coordinating your care, it doesn’t by itself provide medication or direct treatment. Those are arranged through your usual GP and your Veteran Card in the normal way.
How to get started
The program is run through your usual GP, the doctor who provides most of your care and knows your history. If you think you’d benefit, raise it at your next appointment and ask whether you’re eligible. If you are, and you consent, your GP will enrol you and work with you to build your care plan. You can stay in the program for as long as you continue to benefit from it.
Frequently asked questions
Need a condition accepted to unlock your care?
If a mental health condition should be accepted as service-related but isn’t yet, our expert team can help you lodge and support the claim, so you can access the programs and treatment you’re entitled to.
Related from KSC Law
- DVA medical conditions hub
- DVA physiotherapy: what’s covered and how to access it
- DVA glossary of terms and acronyms
- DVA claims and the claims process
External resources
Frequently asked questions
No. The program coordinates your care at no cost to you, your GP is funded by DVA to deliver and coordinate it.
Not as things stand. White Card access to the CVC Program needs a chronic mental health condition that DVA has accepted as service-related. You can still get treatment for any mental health condition through Non-Liability Health Care, and if a condition should be accepted, getting that claim sorted is the path in. Our team can help.
The CVC Program is about coordinating your care, not providing medication or treatment directly. Those are arranged through your GP and your Veteran Card as usual. The value of the program is having it all pulled together and actively managed.