A veteran-centred model to support holistic analysis and reporting of veterans’ health and welfare has been developed as part of a 3-year program of work agreed between the Department of Veterans’ Affairs and the Australian Institute of Health and Welfare (AIHW).

This working paper introduces and applies the veteran-centred model, which is based on the AIHW’s person-centred model. The person-centred model focuses on the experiences and outcomes of the individual, rather than on specific services or the broader health and welfare system.

The person-centred approach identifies the information domains needed to understand the experiences of the population and its various cohorts. There are seven domains across health and welfare: health, housing, social support, education and skills, employment, income and finance, and safety and justice. The domains in the model can be monitored in the context of individual factors, influences of the community and environment, and social determinants of health and wellbeing.

The development of the veteran-centred model involved exploring the domains to identify elements relating to population health and welfare, including those specific to veterans.

This paper aims to assist researchers, students and policymakers who are working to improve veterans’ health and welfare outcomes. This paper can:

• show how the AIHW person-centred model can be relevantly applied to the veteran population
• show how the model will be applied in future reporting on veterans by the AIHW (Next steps)
• prompt improvements to the model by engaging broadly with the research community
• prompt a response from researchers looking at topics across veterans’ health and wellbeing to consider the broader impact and interrelated nature of biological, lifestyle, socioeconomic, societal and environmental factors.