The Recreation Therapy service provides evidence-based clinical treatment services intended to restore the health of veterans with injuries, chronic illnesses, or disabling conditions resulting in diminished physical, cognitive, emotional, psychosocial, or leisure capabilities. The VA offers services that align with expert clinical judgment, the best available research evidence, and the mission, aspiration, purpose, goals, references, and life pursuits of the veterans.

RT’s Creative Arts Therapy program provides evidence-based clinical treatment interventions intended to promote veterans’ health through recovery, rehabilitation, and wellness with art therapy, dance and movement therapy, drama therapy, and music Therapy. The CAT service supports, maintains, and improves psychosocial, physical, and cognitive health, enhancing sensorimotor function, emotional resilience, and social and coping skills; and positively impacts veterans’ quality of life by providing of achievement and engaging them in a process to channel their energy into productive behaviors.

VA defines Community Reintegration as a treatment modality, training tool, and protocol within the RT/CAT service line “to ensure a veteran’s safe integration with the least restrictive environment.” VA Community Reintegration protocols may take place outside the predictable environment of the VA medical facility. Like other RT/CAT interventions, including adaptive sports and “leisure education,” veterans must receive a referral from their VA provider.

• RT’s community reintegration program is available to all VA enrollees who need it.

• An RT/CAT provider must indicate whether a particular intervention will benefit the veteran for a therapeutic purpose contained within their treatment plan.

• One purpose of community reintegration interventions is to assess a veteran’s ability to manage in community-based settings through an experiential process / community reintegration method.

RT/CAT team members also provide veterans with Community Reintegration Training to improve independent functioning impaired by illness or injury if it is expected to be helpful. Veterans’ individual needs determine the purpose and setting of individualized community reintegration plans.

Facility points of contact for local VA RT/CAT programs are listed below by healthcare system:

• VA Bedford: Andrew J. Geddry, Supervisory Recreation Therapist (781) 687-3237

• VA Central Western Massachusetts: Donna Hayes, Lead Recreation Therapist (413) 584-4040 x2350

• VA Boston: Jeffrey Lewis, Supervisory Recreation Therapist (774) 826-3625

VHA Directives supersede other national, VISN-level, and facility-level policies or memos issued to the extent they are in conflict. Directives articulate the reason for issue and provide key definitions; background for the policy and related authorities; exemptions; and the Offices and individuals responsible for its implementation, training, and oversight.

What is Included in the VA Medical Benefits Package

In general, the entire VA medical benefits package is available to all VA enrolled veterans. Specific care must provided when it is determined by a VA provider that the care aligns with generally accepted practice standards and will promote, preserve, or restore the health of a particular veteran.

• Care preserves health if it maintains a veteran’s current quality of life or daily functioning, prevents disease progression, cures disease, or extends the veteran’s life span.

• Care promotes health if it enhances a veteran’s quality of life or daily functioning, prevents future disease, or identifies a predisposition for a condition or early disease onset which can be ameliorated to any extent through monitoring or early diagnosis and treatment.

• Care restores health if it restores a veteran’s quality of life or daily functioning lost due to illness or injury.

What Care is Offered by VA Recreation Therapy & Creative Arts Therapy Service Lines

VA facility directors ensure facilities provide RT/CAT services based on enrolled veterans’ needs, including by supporting efforts to increase access for all veterans who demonstrate a need and integrating RT/CAT therapists into healthcare teams.

• Facility RT/CAT supervisors collaborate with community partners and VA service lines to ensure all eligible veterans have easy access to state-of-the-art services and to make needed services available to all referred veterans, delivering individualized, evidence-based services focused on outcomes.

• As with most services offered within the VA, veterans must receive a referral from their VA provider to participate in RT/CAT programs. This requires that both veterans and providers across all VA services be aware of the nature and availability of RT/CAT services and programs.

The Chief Patient Care Services Officer, Rehabilitation & Prosthetic Services, Office of Patient Care Services is responsible for the content of VHA Directive 1172.05.