Caregiver Assistance Program
Leadership

Power of A: Caring for the Caregivers

Program aids those who care for wounded veterans.

Sometimes, to support members, associations need to support others, too. That was the idea behind the Caregiver Assistance Program of the Military Officers Association of America, which earned MOAA a Summit Award in ASAE’s 2015 Power of A Awards competition.

“One of the most compelling needs within the military community is to increase awareness and raise support for the parents, sons, daughters, and friends who serve as daily caregivers for our nation’s wounded and injured veterans,” says Jim Carman, director of MOAA’s Transition Center.

MOAA collaborated with the USAA Educational Foundation and the American Bar Association to develop the Caregiver Assistance program, which has three parts: an online guide to the legal and financial aspects of caring for wounded veterans; an annual Warrior Family Symposium, which educates caregivers on the health needs of the military community; and a Community Heroes awards program recognizing individuals and organizations that support wounded veterans and military service members.

“Caregivers have to navigate multiple healthcare systems and multiple delivery systems as they move from the Department of Defense to Veterans’ Affairs, the Social Security Administration, and several other [agencies], depending upon their particular situation,” Carman says. “Our goal with this program is to simplify everything for them. And caregivers have told us that this is an excellent resource—especially the online guide—that merges information from multiple sources and expresses it in a language that they can understand.”

(Tim Bieber/ThinkStock)

Rob Stott

By Rob Stott

Rob Stott is a contributing editor for Associations Now. MORE

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