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Homelessness is one of the most challenging issues facing U.S. Veterans and those who serve Veterans. While the overall number of homeless Veterans is declining, the number of homeless women Veterans is increasing, with little clarity as to why. In previous work, we have examined pathways to homelessness among women Veterans, with a focus on proximal pathways, that is, how women perceived themselves to have become homeless at the time of the study. In this paper, we dig deeper into the roots of homelessness, specifically into the social institutional roots of homelessness. We examine women's focus group conversations about entering and experiencing the military, particularly with regard to the common occurrence of sexual violence and trauma before and during military service. Drawing on anthropological concepts, we conceptualize trauma at both an individual level as embodied in women's lived experiences, as well as at a collective, gendered level. Gendered traumatic experiences can accumulate over time, creating or reinforcing vulnerable pathways. For women Veterans, gender and the military are both social institutions that may act in combination to create gendered social roots of homelessness that are particular to women, and that may be relevant to the gender difference in prevalence of homelessness among Veterans.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and other federal agencies require funded researchers to include women in their studies. Historically, many researchers have indicated they will include women in proportion to their VA representation or pointed to their numerical minority as justification for exclusion. However, women's participation in the military—currently 14% of active military—is rapidly changing veteran demographics, with women among the fastest growing segments of new VA users. These changes will require researchers to meet the challenge of finding ways to adequately represent women veterans for meaningful analysis. We describe women veterans' health and health-care use, note how VA care is organized to meet their needs, report gender differences in quality, highlight national plans for women veterans' quality improvement, and discuss VA women's health research. We then discuss challenges and potential solutions for increasing representation of women veterans in VA research, including steps for implementation research.

The Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) and other federal agencies require funded researchers to include women in their studies. Historically, many researchers have indicated they will include women in proportion to their VA representation or pointed to their numerical minority as justification for exclusion. However, women's participation in the military—currently 14% of active military—is rapidly changing veteran demographics, with women among the fastest growing segments of new VA users. These changes will require researchers to meet the challenge of finding ways to adequately represent women veterans for meaningful analysis. We describe women veterans' health and health-care use, note how VA care is organized to meet their needs, report gender differences in quality, highlight national plans for women veterans' quality improvement, and discuss VA women's health research. We then discuss challenges and potential solutions for increasing representation of women veterans in VA research, including steps for implementation research.

AIMS: The Veterans Health Administration (VA) promotes evidence-based complementary and integrative health (CIH) therapies as non-pharmacological approaches for chronic pain. We aimed to examine CIH use by gender among veterans with chronic musculoskeletal pain, and variations in gender differences by race/ethnicity and age. METHODS: We conducted secondary analysis of electronic health records provided by all women (n=79,537) and men (n=389,269) veterans age 18–54 with chronic musculoskeletal pain who received VA-provided care between 2010–2013. Using gender-stratified multivariate binary logistic regression, we examined predictors of CIH use, tested a race/ethnicity-by-age interaction term, and conducted pairwise comparisons of predicted probabilities. RESULTS: Among veterans with chronic musculoskeletal pain, more women than men use CIH (36% vs. 26%), with rates ranging from 25%−42% among women and 15%−29% among men, depending on race/ethnicity and age. Among women, patients under age 44 or Hispanic, White, or patients of other race/ethnicities are similarly likely to use CIH; in contrast, Black women, regardless of age, are least likely to use CIH. Among men, White and Black patients, and especially Black men under age 44, are less likely to use CIH than men of Hispanic or other racial/ethnic identities. CONCLUSIONS: Women veteran patients with chronic musculoskeletal pain are more likely than men to use CIH therapies, with variation in CIH use rates by race/ethnicity and age. Tailoring CIH therapy engagement efforts to be sensitive to gender, race/ethnicity, and age could reduce differential CIH use and thereby help to diminish existing health disparities among veterans.