VHA - New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE)

Our Mission

VA New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE) aims to operationalize innovation and expand it into VHA health care settings.

Our focus is three-fold: technology solutions for chronic and/or complex injuries, rural access to world class health care, and health care and life-style solutions for aging veterans.

Technology Solutions for Chronic and/or Complex Illnesses and Injuries

Rural Access to World-Class Health Care

Health Care and Life-Style Solutions for Aging Veterans

NECIE Wins VA Center for Development and Civic Engagement (CDCE) Spirit Corporate Recruitment Award 2022

CDCE recognizes outstanding programs, community partners, and staff through its American Spirit and Excellence Awards. These awards celebrate successful volunteer recruitment initiatives, high impact programs, robust community partnership efforts, as well as the extraordinary dedication and talent of the VA professionals who support the efforts of CDCE within Veterans Health Administration (VHA) and across the Department.

Mobius Mobility

The IBOT Personal Mobility Device (PMD) is a robotic, multi-modal product that provides people with disabilities, including disabled Veterans, with new levels of freedom and independence. The innovative design offers iBOT PMD users with cutting-edge functionality that can transform the way disabled Veterans interact with the world. It has four driving modes that allow the user to climb curbs, negotiate terrain including sand, snow, and hiking trails, move and interact at eye-level, and even climb stairs. NECIE is leading the collaborative project with Mobius Mobility LLC to deliver iBOT PMDs to each of the 25 VA Spinal Cord Injury and Disability (SCI/D) Center Hubs along with multi-level training to clinicians. NECIE is also coordinating donation of 25 iBOT PMDs to veterans as per outcome of mobility and clinical assessments.

Give Legacy, Inc.

VHA has partnered with Legacy on a new project to test and cryopreserve sperm from 1,000 Global War on Terror Veterans across the United States, investigating the higher rates of infertility in Veterans from recent wars than their civilian peers. Through this project, researchers are collecting and analyzing sperm samples from Veterans, while also exploring possible contributing factors, such as burn pit exposure, post-traumatic stress disorder and traumatic brain injury. The end goal of this project is to provide Veterans the opportunity to preserve healthy samples and improve VHA fertility services for all Veterans.

NECIE Program Wins 2021 HeRO Awardees Non-Clinical Team from a VISN or Facility for Excellence in CARE and HRO Principles.

VA recognizes National HeRO Award recipients for their contributions to VHA's journey to becoming a high reliability organization (HRO). VHA's enterprise-wide journey to high reliability aims to continuously improve its processes by maximizing safety and minimizing harm to achieve the goal of ensuring every patient receives excellent care every time. The HRO values exemplified includes: It's About the Veteran, Duty to Speak and Respect for People.

News and Events

SoldierStrong, a national nonprofit dedicated to helping military veterans take their next steps forward in life after service through the donation of revolutionary medical technologies, and Dean Kamen, founder and president of DEKA Research and Development Corp., announced the launch of Operation Mobility, a 2.5-month, cross-country bus tour to donate 25 iBOT® PMDs.

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Helping New Jersey Veterans Restore Dignity through 25 IBOTs

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"I spent my whole life building medical equipment. I spent years building the iBot to restore dignity, access, balance to somebody that can't walk. It's a medical device," Kamen says.

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When Charles Franklin created the Veterans Employment Rideshare Initiative (Rideshare) in 2018, he wasn't thinking of how it could help in a global pandemic. However, when COVID-19 came to America, he did what any good innovator would do: he adapted.

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The iBOT PMD utilizes advanced electronics, sensors, battery technology and software to let the user go where they want to go.

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Leandro DaSilva

Acting Director, VA New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE)

Leandro DaSilva joined the VA New England Healthcare System in 2011. Mr. DaSilva served in the U.S. Navy from 1999 to 2006, onboard the USS Kitty-Hawk (CV-63) home based in Yokosuka, Japan and at the Naval Pacific Meteorology and Oceanography Facility (NPMOF) in Whidbey Island, WA, where he earned his BS in Business Administration with a major in International Business and an MBA with an emphasis in Global Management. After Honorable Discharge from the U.S. Navy, Leandro worked at UnitedHealth Technologies as a program manager for mergers and acquisitions and integrated technologies solutions. He joined VA in 2011 as a member of the VISN 1 Network Office, as a project manager for the VISN 1 Quality Manager Office, and in November 2017 became a member of the VISN 1 Clinical Informatics team. In 2020 Mr. DaSilva helped launch the VA New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE) as part of the VHA Innovation Ecosystem.

New England Center for Innovation Excellence

Fostering collaborations to address VHA's most pressing health care challenges

Our Mission

Leandro DaSilva

Acting Director, VA New England Center for Innovation Excellence (NECIE)