WASHINGTON — The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs is confronting significant workforce recruitment challenges across its nationwide healthcare system, with officials at all 139 Veterans Health Administration facilities identifying occupations experiencing severe staffing shortages during fiscal year 2026, according to a new report from the VA Office of Inspector General.
The congressionally mandated report, issued September 11, found that Veterans Health Administration officials identified 4,712 severe occupational staffing shortages across the system. The figure represents occupations that local officials considered particularly difficult to staff and should not be interpreted as 4,712 vacant jobs. The Inspector General emphasized that the findings represent facility officials’ assessments at a specific point in time and that the OIG did not independently validate their responses.
Clinical staffing emerged as a major concern. According to the OIG, 97 percent of VA facilities identified severe staffing shortages involving medical officer occupations, while 86 percent reported severe shortages involving nursing occupations. Practical nurses were the most frequently identified clinical shortage, reported by 59 percent of facilities. Psychologists, psychiatrists, social workers and nursing assistants were also among the clinical professions most frequently identified as difficult to staff.
Recruitment difficulties were not limited to direct patient care. Police officers were the most frequently reported nonclinical staffing challenge, identified by 57 percent of facilities. Other frequently cited occupations included custodial workers, medical support assistants, food-service employees and healthcare engineers.
The findings come as the VA continues to serve a large and growing veteran population. Earlier this month, the department announced that more than 250,000 new veterans had enrolled in VA healthcare during 2026 and that more than 1.4 million medical appointments had already been completed or scheduled for those newly enrolled veterans. The department also reported major investments in healthcare infrastructure and expanded access to appointments outside traditional operating hours.
VA leadership has cautioned against treating the Inspector General’s findings as a direct measurement of unfilled jobs. VA Press Secretary Quinn Slaven said the report “is not based on actual VA healthcare facility vacancies and therefore is not a reliable indicator of staffing shortages.” The department has reported vacancy rates of approximately 15 percent for physicians and 9 percent for nurses and maintains that these rates compare favorably with many other healthcare systems.
VA officials have also pointed to broader competition for healthcare professionals, particularly physicians. The department says federal statutory compensation limits can make recruitment more difficult when specialists may receive substantially higher salaries elsewhere. Slaven said VA wants to work with Congress to address the “longstanding pay disparity” affecting recruitment of healthcare professionals.
VA Secretary Doug Collins has maintained that medical facilities retain authority to recruit employees needed to deliver veteran care. During testimony before lawmakers earlier this year, Collins said, “We will hire every need that we have in the department,” adding that VA hospitals have autonomy to hire personnel according to their operational requirements.
Collins has simultaneously emphasized improvements in services for veterans. Announcing the enrollment of more than 250,000 new veterans this year, he said the administration is working to transform VA into an organization that “always puts Veterans first,” pointing to efforts to reduce waiting times, expand direct and community care and invest in healthcare facilities.
The staffing findings have also generated scrutiny from Congress. Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee, said the report indicates that staffing challenges continue to affect the VA healthcare system. His interpretation differs from the department’s position that the OIG survey primarily measures the difficulty of recruiting particular occupations rather than actual vacancies.
That distinction is important. The Inspector General explained that an occupation may be classified as experiencing a severe shortage regardless of whether a particular facility currently has no vacancies or numerous openings. Consequently, the 4,712 figure measures reported occupational staffing challenges rather than a head count of missing employees.
The report nevertheless provides a nationwide picture of the occupations VA healthcare leaders consider hardest to staff. With all 139 facilities reporting shortages and nursing, medicine, mental health and hospital-support positions appearing prominently, recruitment and retention are likely to remain central workforce issues as the department seeks to maintain timely, high-quality healthcare for America’s veterans.
The OIG issued no formal recommendations with the report, describing the review as an informational assessment required by Congress. Its findings provide VA leadership and lawmakers with data that can be considered when determining recruitment strategies and special hiring authorities for difficult-to-fill healthcare occupations.
