Veterans Affairs committee  I was talking to somebody in this room earlier about having too many case managers. Case management starts with an assessment. It's a very holistic assessment of what that individual client's needs, wants, and even dreams are for living a fruitful and productive life. It's based

Veterans Affairs committee  Case management is about coordinating care. That's exactly what you're talking about, so that is the expertise of a case manager, to coordinate that care. It's going to take those roles of heavy communication, heavy collaboration, navigation, and advocating the systems and the ot

Veterans Affairs committee  In lots of cases you're not talking about an episode of care that has a start and a stop; you are talking about—I don't want to use the word continuum—a journey, for sure. I think, like any journey—that's what Nancy's referred to—there are times for intensive case management, and

Veterans Affairs committee  Absolutely.

Veterans Affairs committee  For me to help with that decision-making, it is the strength of networking. That's why we are called a network. Anybody in his or her job gains experience from networking with mentors, as Nancy's talking about, and with others. When we started writing our standards of practice, w

Veterans Affairs committee  I think it is building that body of knowledge. We are a relatively new field. We're not as old as medicine, but we can learn from those examples. By building that body of knowledge and working together and sharing resources, that's how we're going to work smarter, not necessarily