Military to Civilian Transition: Actions Needed to Ensure Effective Mental Health Screening at Separation , June 5 , 2025
Military to Civilian Transition: Actions Needed to Ensure Effective Mental Health Screening at Separation , June 5 , 2025
From the report: "Federal law and Department of Defense (DOD) policy require health exams for service members separating from active duty. DOD administers most exams for these service members. The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) administers these exams for service members filing for disability benefits at separation, such as those with an illness or injury caused by military service. To help coordinate efforts, VA and DOD developed a joint separation health assessment with mental health screens not included in DOD’s existing separation exam. VA implemented the joint assessment in April 2023. As of May 2025, DOD had not implemented the joint assessment but had completed a pilot of it at three sites.
The joint assessment includes five mental health screens for 1) depression, 2) suicide risk, 3) alcohol use, 4) post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and 5) violence risk. GAO found that two of these mental health screens are validated tools. This means that they have been tested and determined to be both effective at identifying individuals at risk for a specific condition and reliable at yielding consistent results if administered to the same individual more than once. Two of the other mental health screens are based on validated tools, but VA and DOD modified the screens without validating the changes.
The remaining joint assessment screen for violence risk is not based on a validated tool. It was included for consistency with other DOD health assessment forms, according to officials. Research shows that violence screening may be useful for service members, but multiple subject matter experts GAO interviewed expressed concerns about the violence risk screen’s effectiveness."
Authors - Government Accountability Office (GAO)Related Resources
