May 6, 2008

Statement of The Honorable James B. Peake, M.D., Secretary of Veterans Affairs, before the Committee on Veterans Affairs United States House of Representatives About the Veteran's Suicide Rate

Secretary Peake addressed the Committee about issues related to veterans suicide rates. He discussed what the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) knows, its sources of information, what data are unknown, what VA proposes to do, and current VA actions to address the issue of suicide from a clinical perspective. He noted that the VA has adopted the definition of suicidal behavior developed by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC). The CDC definition includes suicidal ideation and attempts. VA and the Department of Defense derive the veterans suicide rate from VA benefits data, the Social Security Administration, and data compiled by the National Center for Health Statistics (NCHS). A key problem to assessing veterans suicide rates is that the NCHS data does not track veteran status. To address this, VA sends NCHS a list of veterans who have not been treated by VA in the past 12 months. NCHS reviews the list and adds the cause of death listed on the death certificate. VA approximates the suicide rate from this process.