After a number of delays and setbacks, Lane County veterans are looking forward to the VA Eugene Healthcare Center being completed next year.

Ground-breaking construction for the new clinic began on April 21 and is anticipated to open during the summer of 2015.

The existing clinic, located on River Avenue, can accommodate a maximum of 10,000 patients. With nearly 35,000 veterans in Lane County, this clinic no longer seems feasible.

Carrie Boothe, the VA Affairs Specialist for the Roseburg healthcare system, said that the number of veterans in Eugene is expected to continue to rise.

“The current clinic is two buildings, they total 25,000 square feet. The new clinic will consolidate to one location with more than 100,000 square feet of usable space.”

The current Eugene VA Clinic is also lacking services that many veterans could benefit from. Due to the clinic’s small size, a number of Lane County veterans find themselves traveling to Portland, Roseburg and Bend to receive medical care in a timely manner.

According to Ed Ortega, the assistant director of the Veterans and Family Student Association at the University of Oregon, because of the hassle to get into the Eugene Clinic, a lot of veterans will refrain from going to the doctor when they are sick; consequently, becoming more sick in the long-run.

“It is common to have to wait to get into a clinic,” Ortega said. “It will serve as another option that hopefully more veterans will use.”

In addition to having a larger capacity for patients, the new healthcare center will provide a variety of services that the old clinic does not have. Some of these services include dental, podiatry, laboratory, surgery and a dispensing pharmacy.

Chris Taylor, a U.S. Army veteran and UO junior, thinks the clinic will be very convenient for student veterans.

“I think with them adding in the new facilities it increases their ability to give better care,” Taylor said. “If you have the flu or something like that, you don’t want to have to drive an hour to go to the doctor.”

UO offers a number of services to student veterans and their families, but free healthcare is not one of them. Therefore, going to the UO Health Center is not a viable option.

“For anyone who is deployed, you get five full years of medical coverage right when you get out at any VA location,” Taylor said.

Due to the Eugene VA Clinic being so overcrowded, student veterans often have trouble getting medical care when they need it. Taylor said a lot of student veterans do not have cars, so traveling to other cities to go to a VA Clinic is very inconvenient.

The new VA Eugene Healthcare Clinic is expected to alleviate veterans of these difficulties and provide medical care closer to home.