# Improving Housing Outcomes for Homeless Veterans

> **NIH VA IK2** · VA GREATER LOS ANGELES HEALTHCARE SYSTEM · 2021 · —

## Abstract

Background/Rationale: Across VA—despite the availability of numerous evidence-based housing
interventions—many homeless Veterans still struggle to obtain and sustain housing. Social skills (interpersonal
communication or instrumental skills, like money management) are an important—but underappreciated—
determinant of housing outcomes for homeless adults. However, social skills interventions are usually absent
from the array of VA homeless services.
Objectives: This CDA will prepare me to become a VA implementation scientist focused on vulnerable
populations, particularly homeless-experienced Veterans; it will develop and study the implementation and
effectiveness of a “skills intervention”—built from existing, effective social skills interventions and focused on
housing-related social skills—tailored to the VA Supportive Housing (VASH) program. This intervention will be
co-delivered by a consumer provider (“peer”) and a licensed clinical social worker, aiming to improve VASH
participants' housing retention and mental health. Using the theoretical framework of the Behavioral Model for
Vulnerable Populations, with additional guidance from the Consolidated Framework for Implementation
Research (CFIR), the Specific Aims are to: 1) develop a skills intervention that improves housing retention and
mental health among homeless-experienced Veterans; 2) in a controlled pilot trial, study the feasibility,
acceptability, and effectiveness of the skills intervention on factors strongly associated with improved housing
retention and mental health among homeless-experienced Veterans, including enabling factors (social skills,
cognition) and behaviors (health service use, social interactions, money management); and 3) examine barriers
to and facilitators of future implementation of the skills intervention in routine VASH care.
Methods: To achieve Specific Aim 1, we will complement our ongoing literature review of social skills training
interventions by conducting key informant interviews; we will also use the RAND/UCLA appropriateness
method to convene an expert panel of local and national homeless program stakeholders (Veteran consumer
providers, VA staff, and leadership). Specific Aims 2 and 3 entail a controlled pilot trial of the intervention that
employs an effectiveness-implementation hybrid type 1 design. For Specific Aim 2, we will implement the skills
intervention within two VA Greater Los Angeles (GLA) VASH teams. We will assess its feasibility and
acceptability, also comparing changes (from baseline to 6-month follow-up) in social skills, service use, social
interactions, and money management among Veterans who receive the intervention (n=30) vs. a control group
(n=20) of Veterans on distinct GLA VASH teams receiving usual care. For Specific Aim 3, we will use surveys
and qualitative methods to explore potential barriers to and facilitators of future implementation of the
intervention in routine care. The CDA training component will focus on implemen...

## Key facts

- **NIH application ID:** 10308693
- **Project number:** 5IK2HX002089-05
- **Recipient organization:** VA GREATER LOS ANGELES HEALTHCARE SYSTEM
- **Principal Investigator:** Sonya Emi Gabrielian
- **Activity code:** IK2 (R01, R21, SBIR, etc.)
- **Funding institute:** VA
- **Fiscal year:** 2021
- **Award amount:** —
- **Award type:** 5
- **Project period:** 2017-03-01 → 2022-02-28

## Primary source

NIH RePORTER: https://reporter.nih.gov/project-details/10308693

## Citation

> US National Institutes of Health, RePORTER application 10308693, Improving Housing Outcomes for Homeless Veterans (5IK2HX002089-05). Retrieved via AI Analytics 2026-05-22 from https://api.ai-analytics.org/grant/nih/10308693. Licensed CC0.

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