Massachusetts Plans Pilot Letting 10 Veteran Medics Give Medications

Featured image: The Bulfinch Building at Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston, Dec. 4, 2024 (file photo). The Healey administration’s announcement did not name the hospitals that would take part in the pilot. Photo: Kenneth C. Zirkel, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 4.0.

Key points drawn from the Healey-Driscoll administration’s Nov. 10, 2026, press release and from reporting by WBUR and GBH News.

Massachusetts plans a Military to Medicine pilot that would let 10 veterans who served as military medics perform certain medication tasks at participating hospitals, without rewriting professional licensing rules, the Healey-Driscoll administration announced this week. The proposal still must go out for public comment, and officials have not named participating hospitals or a start date.

The Department of Public Health and the Executive Office of Veterans Services presented the initiative at the Public Health Council meeting on Tuesday, Nov. 10, according to a state press release issued the same day. WBUR and GBH News reported on the plan on Wednesday, Nov. 11, Veterans Day. As of Thursday, Nov. 12, 2026, Eastern Time, the administration had not posted a comment period, a hearing date, or draft regulatory text in the announcement itself.

What the pilot would — and would not — do

Under the proposal, 10 eligible veterans who previously served as military medics would work at participating hospitals licensed by the Department of Public Health, subject to the department’s approval, the release said. They would be allowed to perform “certain medication administration activities.” The administration said the pilot would explore how those veterans could apply their training “without making broader changes to professional licensing or scope-of-practice requirements.”

The announcement does not list which medications would be covered, what supervision or additional training would be required, how veterans would be chosen, or which hospitals have agreed to participate. Those details, if they appear, would have to come in the draft regulations or in later guidance. The rules are not final. Officials said they “will be put forward for public comment as part of the state’s review process.”

If the regulations are approved and the pilot is carried out, the Executive Office of Veterans Services would evaluate how military medical experience translates into civilian health care roles and whether the program helps hospitals recruit and retain workers, according to the release. GBH News, citing the same plan, said the state’s veterans agency would assess the program after public comment and approval.

The credential gap officials say they are trying to close

Gov. Maura Healey, in the administration’s statement, said military medics “have some of the most extensive training and experience in health care, often serving under incredibly challenging circumstances,” but that “when they return home, too many face barriers to putting those skills to work.” She called the program a way to create “new career opportunities for veterans while supporting the hospitals and patients who can benefit from their skills and expertise.”

The release said that each year, thousands of service members transition to civilian life, including medics and hospital corpsmen with extensive hands-on medical experience, but that experience “does not automatically qualify them for comparable civilian health care roles,” often leading veterans to pursue additional credentials or leave medicine. Veterans Services Secretary Eric Goralnick, quoted in the same statement, called Military to Medicine “a novel program that builds on a proven Veterans Health Administration model to turn that experience into civilian health care careers.”

In an interview with WBUR, Goralnick described military medics as a “Swiss Army knife for military medicine,” trained in work ranging from emergency and ambulatory care to surgery and prescriptions. “They are more than a patient care assistant,” he told WBUR’s Fausto Menard. “They’re some combination of a nurse, a physician assistant, a doctor … So it’s a missed opportunity for people with really wonderful training to contribute to the healthcare workforce.” WBUR reported that Goralnick said the state is learning from a similar program in Virginia that has partnered with more than 50 health care facilities.

Heather Meehan, a former U.S. Navy hospital corpsman, said in the administration’s statement that after providing care in cardiac intensive care, intensive care, and medical-surgical settings, she was told she qualified only as a certified nursing assistant and then that she was overqualified for that role. “At a time when Massachusetts faces significant healthcare workforce shortages, we cannot afford to overlook veterans with extensive medical training, clinical experience, and proven patient care skills,” she said.

Support also came from lawmakers who oversee veterans policy and from veterans organizations quoted in the release, including State Sen. John Velis, the Senate chair of the Joint Committee on Veterans and Federal Affairs, and State Rep. Joseph McGonagle, the House chair. Velis said the effort “helps strengthen our health care workforce while maintaining appropriate safeguards for patient safety.” The release itself does not describe those safeguards in detail beyond the limited size of the pilot and the statement that broader licensing rules would remain in place.

Rachel McNeill, co-founder of the Veterans Collaborative, told GBH News that the inability of veterans to transfer certain job skills into civilian work is “a consistent issue.” Bruce Buckley, CEO and president of Soldier On, a Pittsfield-based nonprofit that works with homeless veterans, told GBH the pilot “will allow those men and women to really have a path out of the military that’s more impactful.” Coverage of veterans in Massachusetts often returns to that same gap between military training and civilian credentials.

By the numbers: hospital staffing shortages the pilot is meant to ease

Officials framed the proposal as a response to hospital workforce shortages, but the Nov. 10 announcement did not include vacancy figures or an estimate of how many veterans in Massachusetts would be eligible. Public Health Commissioner Robbie Goldstein said in the release that the initiative “has the potential to strengthen the state’s healthcare workforce and support continued access to safe, high-quality patient care.” He did not quantify that potential.

Separate, official data show why staffing is a live issue in Massachusetts health care, even though those figures are not part of the Military to Medicine announcement. In a 2025 workforce survey whose executive summary the Center for Health Information and Analysis published in February 2026, licensed practical nurses had an 18% vacancy rate in acute-care hospitals and in home health agencies, and a 26% vacancy rate among private human-services operators. Registered nurses had a 26% vacancy rate in nursing homes, 14% in public hospitals, and 13% among private human-services operators, according to the same summary. Nearly 80% of nursing homes identified registered nurses as the single most difficult role to recruit, CHIA reported.

Those survey results describe a broader labor market than a 10-person pilot can fill. The administration has not said the program is designed to close those vacancy rates, and The Boston Report is not presenting the CHIA figures as proof of the pilot’s effect. They are the most recent statewide official snapshot of the shortages officials say the program is intended, in a limited way, to address. A 10-veteran pilot, if it is approved, would be a test of credentialing and supervision, not a staffing plan for the state’s hospital system.

Hospital staffing has also been at the center of other Boston-area labor news this week. Brigham and Women’s Hospital nurses and Mass General Brigham reached a tentative contract on Wednesday that the union said addresses the hospital’s use of temporary nurses, among other issues, as The Boston Report reported Thursday. That agreement is a separate labor dispute and is not part of the Military to Medicine proposal.

What comes next

The immediate next step, according to the administration, is public comment on proposed regulations. The Nov. 10 release did not say when that comment period will open, how long it will last, or when the Public Health Council might vote. Until those notices appear, the pilot remains a plan, not an operating program.

This Week in Worcester, in a Nov. 11 report on the announcement, noted that lawmakers have filed bills on a similar idea in every legislative session since at least 2017, and that the current version, House Bill 2365, filed by Rep. Bruce Ayers, a Quincy Democrat, would let military medical personnel perform certain delegated medical tasks under a licensed physician’s supervision. That bill is a separate legislative track from the administration’s regulatory pilot. The press release does not describe H.2365 as the legal basis for Military to Medicine.

The administration tied the announcement to other veteran-employment steps already on the books, including provisions in the 2024 HERO Act that expanded the Vet-Hire Tax Credit, the elimination of apprenticeship registration renewal fees for veterans, and 32 businesses that the release said have become certified, or have pledged to become certified, as Veteran Ready Businesses. Those programs are also separate from the 10-person hospital pilot.

For now, the public record is the state’s own description of a narrow experiment: 10 veteran medics, certain medication tasks, at still-unnamed Department of Public Health-licensed hospitals, with licensing rules otherwise left in place, and an evaluation to follow if the regulations survive public comment and approval.

Sources

• Mass.gov: Governor Healey Announces New Program for Military Medics to Transition to Civilian Health Care Careers
• WBUR: Mass. officials propose pilot program to help former military medics find careers in healthcare
• GBH News: New Mass. plan helps veterans to transition to civilian health care jobs
• Center for Health Information and Analysis: Massachusetts Health Care and Human Services Workforce Survey 2025, executive summary (February 2026)
• This Week in Worcester: Pilot would let 10 veteran medics give medications in Mass. hospitals
• State Sen. John Velis: Governor Healey Announces New Program for Military Medics to Transition to Civilian Health Care Careers