VA Blue Button Moves Ahead With Vets Health Records

The Blue Button is a way for a vet to download their personal health record, maybe to bring to a doctor or clinic. It's a moving target, a big step toward getting more info available and accessible. It's one of many efforts across government to provide better medical care at lowercost for everyone.

Blue Button draws mostly on data entered by the vet, but also has a connection to health information from the Department of Veterans Affairs. DoD has one too. Because they coordinated so closely they are nearly identical. You don't see that every day in large agencies.

The deal is that Veterans Affairs has greatly accelerated the rate at which they serve vets, with lots more to come. Vets can access their Blue Button records at myhealth.va.gov