Upon completion of the educational activity, participants should be able to:

POSTER SESSIONS 

• Describe innovative approaches that improve access, quality, and coordination of healthcare services for Veterans. 
• Identify trauma-informed, whole-person care strategies that address the complex health needs of Veterans. 
• Examine how technology, research, and Veteran engagement can advance patient-centered healthcare delivery. 
• Apply leadership and quality improvement strategies to strengthen systems and support professionals serving Veterans. 

CEDRIC KING: Opening Keynote: Marathons, Meaning, Mercy

• Identify strategies for leading with courage, compassion, and intentionality to positively influence teams, organizations, and the communities they serve. 

LIGHTENING ROUNDS 

• Integrate trauma-informed, community-based, and evidence-informed strategies that improve the behavioral, social, and functional health of Veterans through interdisciplinary partnerships and Veteran-centered care. 
• Apply current evidence-based clinical guidelines, risk assessment tools, and interdisciplinary care models to improve cardiovascular, chronic disease, and transitional care outcomes for Veterans. 

TERESA AND FLOYED HOWES: The Decision to Love: Cultivating the Other 500 Acres

• Identify strategies for creating safety within military, civilian, and veteran relationships by recognizing strengths and challenges, communicating feelings and needs through intentional dialogue, and understanding how seeking professional support and making a conscious decision to love can strengthen relationships. 

LINDSEY CHADWICK: Beyond Dogs and Horses: Animal-Assisted Psychotherapy with Novel Species

• Identify ways diverse animal species can be integrated into therapeutic programming to support veterans. 
• Recognize how novelty in animal-assisted psychotherapy can enhance engagement and therapeutic outcomes. 

VET-HOME PANEL: From Exposure to Care: How VHA/VET-HOME Assists Veterans with Military Environmental Exposures 

• Describe the types of military environmental exposures encountered by Veterans and the potential short- and long-term health effects associated with these exposures. 
• Explain the role of the VHA/VET-HOME program in identifying, evaluating, and coordinating care for Veterans with military environmental exposure concerns. 
• Identify available VHA resources, referral pathways, and clinical best practices to improve the assessment, education, and management of Veterans with military environmental exposure-related health conditions. 

ADVOCACY PANEL: Passion to Purpose: How Lived Experience Becomes Veteran Advocacy

• Describe how controlled exposure to the fight-or-flight response can be reframed through experiential interventions to support trauma recovery. 
• Identify the role of community, skill acquisition, and purpose-building in improving mental health outcomes among veterans. 

JENNIFER BUSS: Data Drive Decision Making

• Identify key principles of data-driven decision-making and explain how evidence can be used to inform strategic planning, policy, and program development. 

SHAUNA SPRINGER: What Warriors Need Now: Innovative Biological Approaches, Moral Repair, and Insight Beyond Cultural Competence

• Describe the biological and neurophysiological factors that influence the mental health and recovery of Service Members and Veterans and explain how these factors inform innovative treatment approaches. 
• Differentiate moral injury from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and identify evidence-informed strategies that support moral repair, healing, and recovery. 
• Apply military-informed perspectives, biological principles, and moral repair frameworks to enhance clinical practice, improve engagement, and support positive outcomes for Service Members, Veterans, and their families. 

MORAL INJURY PANEL: From Silence to Healing

• Describe the core components of the Brothers After War Workshop and identify how experiential elements facilitate healing. 
• Review key findings from the program evaluation research of Brothers At War Workshops. 
• Distinguish between moral injury and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. 
• Analyze how film and the performing arts convey moral injury for veterans. 

KEN WEINGARDT: Heroic Hearts Project: Psychedelics Healing for Veterans

• Describe the current evidence supporting psychedelic-assisted therapies and their potential role in the treatment of mental health conditions affecting Service Members and Veterans. 

CONCURRENT SESSIONS 
A1: Rural Veteran Peer Navigation: Building Access and Trust 

• Describe the core components of a rural resource peer navigation model for veterans. 
• Identify how community partnerships and peer-based engagement can improve access, coordination, and continuity of care in rural and frontier settings. 

A2: From Survival to Responsibility: Rebuilding Identity, Connection, and Purpose in Veterans After Trauma 

• Identify trauma-related survival behaviors in Veterans and apply practical strategies to promote identity development, personal responsibility, connection, and purpose. 

B1: What Happens When the Injured Brain Becomes Treatment Target: Early Outcomes From Inner Armor Protocol in Veterans With PTSD, TBI, & Depression 

• Describe the clinical rationale for combining TMS, ketamine, HBOT, and culturally competent psychotherapy in veterans with PTSD, TBI, and depression. 
• Identify how an integrated outpatient protocol could be adapted through healthcare-community partnerships to improve functional recovery in military-connected populations. 

B2: Before the Next Chapter: Operation ReWire as a Protective Approach to Suicide Prevention for Transitioning Military Registered Nurses 

• Discuss replicable community-based model for upstream, protective suicide risk reduction for military registered nurses. 

C1: After Thirty-three Years of Guilt: Art Therapy Helps to Heal Moral Injury 

• Identify creative and evidence-informed therapeutic approaches that support Veterans experiencing moral injury through art therapy, cognitive behavioral strategies, and trauma-informed interventions. 

C2: Healing Circles as a Trauma-Informed Peer Support Model in VA Settings: Outcomes for Healthcare Providers and Veterans

• Describe the Healing Circles methodology and its alignment with trauma-informed care principles applicable to VA healthcare settings. 
• Identify at least two ways peer support programs such as Healing Circles can strengthen provider well-being and psychological safety, with implications for Veteran patient care quality. 

D1: Advancing Equity in Veteran Care: Addressing Military Service as a Social Determinant of Health Across Diverse and Underserved Populations 

• Describe how military service functions as a SDOH; 2. Identify trauma-informed culturally sensitive strategies for equitable outcomes. 

D2: The Missing Middle: How Low-Barrier Support Strengthens Engagement in Mental Health Care 

• Identify how low-barrier support models can enhance engagement in mental health care by promoting connection, accountability, and goal-oriented support alongside clinical services. 

A3: A Decade of Grassroots Veteran Engagement Informing National VA Policy: A Partnership Journey 

• Evaluate how tensions between community-driven and institutional logics (e.g., pace, accountability, evidence standards, regulatory constraints) can be productively navigated to support sustained implementation and systems change. 
• Synthesize principles from community-engaged research and implementation science to assess how grassroots initiatives can be translated into scalable models that influence regional and national policy. 

A4: Zealous Engagement in Advocacy and Legislation (ZEAL) on Behalf of Veterans with Rare Diseases: Project ZEAL 

• Explain how the technology industry has expanded communication through various applications that allow individuals to communicate through eye movements and even portable, noninvasive electroencephalographic (EEG) brainwave detectors. 

B3: High-risk Eye and Limb Preservation Program (HELPP): A Collaborative Care Model for Diabetic Complications Using Telehealth 

• Describe how a collaborative telehealth-based care model can improve early identification, prevention, and management of high-risk diabetic eye and limb complications among Veterans. 

B4: Invisible Until It’s Too Late: The Case for Financial Instability as an Early Screening Pathway for Gambling Harm in Veterans and Servicemembers 

• Utilize a gambling model grounded in a public health approach that recognizes financial instability as an early signal of gambling-related harm, addressing current gaps in early detection at the intersection of healthcare and financial systems. 

C3: How Veterans Can Be Emotional Architects: Trauma Healing Through Building Meaning 

• Explain how disrupted identity systems contribute to both trauma responses and addictive behaviors, the clinical importance of fostering autonomy and agency in the recovery process. 

C4: Investigating the Molecular Physiology Elicited in Military Veterans with Post-traumatic Stress Disorder Paired with Psychiatric Service Dogs 

• Describe the physiological responses elicited by service dogs that result in symptom reduction.

D3: Addressing Gaps in Pain Care Access: A Qualitative Study with Rural Veterans 

• Identify barriers to rural veterans’ access to pain care. 
• Describe strategies to reduce barriers to rural care. 

D4: Mission Wellness: Bridging the Gap Between Military and Veteran Family and Career Planning 

• Identify barriers and facilitators to career and family planning in current and former service members. 
• Discuss implications of educational "mhealth" tools to address gaps in knowledge and resources in military family and career planning. 

JON MACASKILL: Closing Keynote: Unleashing Inner Strength: Developing Preparedness, Resilience, Grit, and Compassion Through Mindfulness 

• Describe the role of mindfulness practices in strengthening preparedness, resilience, grit, and self-compassion in both personal and professional settings. 
• Identify evidence-based mindfulness techniques that can be applied to improve stress management, emotional regulation, and adaptive coping during challenging situations. 
• Apply practical mindfulness strategies to foster resilience, enhance compassionate engagement with others, and support sustained well-being and performance.
   

Commercial Support 
There is no commercial support for this activity.