Your Health Care Costs | Veterans Affairs
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Understanding VA health care costs
Can I get free VA health care as a Veteran?
You can get free VA health care for any illness or injury that we determine is related to your military service (called “service connected”).
We also provide certain other services for free. These include readjustment counseling and related mental health services, care for issues related to military sexual trauma (MST), and a registry health exam to determine if you’re at risk of health problems linked to your military service.
Find out how to get mental health care
Learn more about services for military sexual trauma
Explore health issues related to service history
Review more services we provide at no cost
You may qualify for additional free VA health care depending on your income, disability rating, or other special eligibility factors. Keep reading below to learn more.
Will I need to pay for any of my care, tests, or medications?
You may need to pay a fixed amount for some types of care, tests, and medications you receive from a VA health care provider or an approved community health care provider to treat conditions not related to your service. This is called a copay (short for “copayment”).
Whether or not you’ll need to pay copays—and how much you’ll pay—depends on your disability rating, income level, military service record, and which of our 8 priority groups we assign you to when you enroll in VA health care. For example, if you have a service-connected condition that we’ve rated at 50% or more disabling or that we’ve determined makes you unable to work (called unemployable), or if you’ve received a Medal of Honor, we’ll assign you to priority group 1 and you won’t pay copays for any types of care, tests, or medications.
Learn more about priority groups
Review current copay rates
If you haven’t applied for VA health care yet, you can review VA health care eligibility requirements or use our Health Benefits Explorer tool to see what your copays may be if you enroll.
Learn more about VA health care eligibility requirements
Go to the Health Benefits Explorer
For more information, play our Veteran copayments video (YouTube).
How we assess and verify your income to determine eligibility and copays
How does VA determine whether I’ll need to pay copays based on my income?
If you’re not already receiving VA disability compensation or pension payments, or don’t have special eligibility factors (like receiving the Medal of Honor), we’ll ask for information about your income as part of our health care enrollment process. This is called an income assessment or financial assessment (formerly known as a means test). We’re required by law to collect this information.
We use your income information to help determine:
- If you’re eligible for VA health care based on your income, and
- Whether you’ll need to pay copays for certain types of care or medications
Learn more about applying for VA health care
Do I have to provide this information?
If you qualify for VA health care enhanced eligibility status, you won’t need to provide your income information.
Review the requirements for enhanced eligibility status
If you don’t qualify for enhanced eligibility status, but you agree to pay copays for your care, you don’t have to provide your financial information. But if you don’t, we may decline your enrollment. We also won’t be able to consider your eligibility for free medications or beneficiary travel pay.
