Spokane’s VA Medical Center is preparing to open a new primary care clinic for veterans on Washington State University’s downtown Spokane campus.
The clinic will be located in the Spokane Teaching Health Center, where Providence providers already see patients. The VA will occupy space that is vacant. "It's a more central location. It gives veterans options," said Dr. Kimberly Morris, the designated education officer and chief of Geriatrics Rehabilitation and Extended Care (GREC) at the Mann-Grandstaff VA Medical Center. "The bus route is very close to the Spokane Teaching Health Center."
Morris says opening a clinic there also gives the VA a chance to get more involved in the academic side of medical and allied health training in downtown Spokane. The clinic is one of two veterans’ demonstration projects around the nation that involve partnerships with academic institutions.
“It’s a benefit for the VA because being affiliated with a comprehensive health sciences organization like ours, they feel like they will be able to recruit individuals in who have an interest with being affiliated with educational institutions," said Dr. Darryl DeWald, WSU’s vice president for health sciences and chancellor of the university’s Spokane campus.
Morris says the VA's presence in downtown Spokane will also help Mann-Grandstaff rebuild the infrastructure for its own medical research program.
The new clinic has been approved at the highest levels of the federal government. The VA is expected to begin moving in people and equipment soon and open later this fall.