VA facility-based telehealth is generally built around the veteran being physically present somewhere in the United States or a U.S. territory at the time of the appointment. This is not an accident of bad web design — it stems from state medical licensure rules for VA providers and federal controlled-substance prescribing laws (the Ryan Haight Act), which do not extend to a provider treating a patient who is physically located in a foreign country. That is why VA.gov search tools keep routing overseas veterans back to a stateside facility: the system assumes you are located within U.S. jurisdiction.
For veterans who are service-connected and living abroad, the main VA program built for this situation is the Foreign Medical Program (FMP), administered out of the VA's Health Administration Center in Denver. FMP does not provide VA telehealth from U.S.-based clinicians; instead, it reimburses veterans for care obtained from local providers in the country where they live, for conditions that are service-connected — in this case, PTSD rated 100% P&T would qualify. You enroll by contacting the FMP office directly (not through the general VA facility locator), and once enrolled you can seek mental health treatment from a psychologist, psychiatrist, or counselor in Portugal and submit those bills for reimbursement.
Official 2026 VA monthly compensation, including the 2.8% COLA increase.
Dependent add-ons start at a 30% rating. Child-only and dependent-parent rates: see the full 2026 pay chart.
| Rating | Monthly (2026, incl. 2.8% COLA) |
|---|---|
| 10% | $180.42 |
| 20% | $356.66 |
| 30% | $552.47 |
| 40% | $795.84 |
| 50% | $1,132.90 |
| 60% | $1,435.02 |
| 70% | $1,808.45 |
| 80% | $2,102.15 |
| 90% | $2,362.30 |
| 100% | $3,938.58 |
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Analyze my claim free →Some veterans also explore VA Vet Centers, which occasionally offer telehealth counseling, but their authority to treat someone physically outside the U.S. is similarly constrained, so availability varies and should not be assumed. A small number of overseas veterans have had success asking their VA mental health team directly whether any exception process or OCONUS pilot applies to their case, since policy in this area has been evolving and is not uniformly published on the public website.
Because this is a jurisdictional and licensing issue rather than a simple website bug, the fastest real fix is bypassing the general search tool entirely. Call the VA's Foreign Medical Program office directly to enroll and ask specifically about mental health coverage options for a veteran residing in Portugal, and also contact your current or most recent VA mental health provider or Vet Center to ask whether they have any overseas telehealth exception process before you leave or shortly after arrival, since setting this up before a gap in care occurs is easier than trying to fix it from abroad.
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