JTS Summit Tackles Challenges Facing Combatant Commands
The JTS Committee of Surgical Combat Casualty Care hosted the first summit to address the needs of Trauma Medical Directors and Trauma Program Managers stateside and abroad. This conference was geared at linking the roles of trauma leaders in the Military Health System to support the readiness mission and its translation into a functioning deployed trauma system in the operational (forward) realm.
Goals:
- Understand the problem
- Establish a community of military and civilian surgeons who understand the problem
- Build a framework for trauma systems capability in CONUS MTFs and Combatant Commands (CCMDs)
- Define components necessary to maintain trauma system expertise in the Military Health System
- Define resources, personnel, leadership, and strategy needed to deliver high quality trauma care in the CCMD Trauma Systems and the MTFs.
Read about the challenges facing the CCMDs and the recommendations to address them.
JTS Helps NATO Nations Build Trauma Care Systems
The Joint Trauma System (JTS) is mentoring the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) nations building combat casualty care programs through the NATO Military Healthcare Working Group (MHCWG). The mission of the MCHWG is "to initiate and develop common principles, policies, doctrines, concepts, procedures, techniques, programs, and initiatives in the military health care field… (and) develop evidence-based NATO military healthcare advice in order to advance clinical policy, develop common professional medical techniques and standards, and ensure continuous quality improvement."
With 28 European and two North American nations, and a successful record of maintaining collective security since 1949, NATO is perhaps the most important strategic partner for the United States. As an alliance of sovereign nations that does not fall under a structure of command and control unless under wartime footing, NATO is a coalition of the willing. JTS has worked with NATO military medical committees in the past, including the Blood Panel. The Blood Panel is working on blood interoperability within the alliance– an essential process with growing impact. JTS has made notable contributions to the program; JTS Chief COL Gurney and JTS Deputy Chief Dr. Mary Ann Spott are key contributors.
The MHCWG is subordinate to the Committee of the Chiefs of Military Medical Services in NATO (COMEDS), which includes Maj Gen Paul Friedrichs, the U.S. Joint Staff Surgeon and supporter of JTS. The MHCWG has several subordinate NATO panels for military medicine, including the Emergency Medicine Panel, the Special Operations Forces Medicine Panel, and the Blood Panel.
This past fall CTS Operations Branch Chief Col Baker attended the 34th meeting of the MHCWG in Aarhus,
Denmark. An important agenda item was the adoption of the Tägerwilen 2 Report for advancing pre-hospital care improvement initiative priorities and concurrence to publish as a Standardization Recommendation. The soon-to-be-published report expands on four critical priorities: Tactical Casualty Care, Blood Far Forward, Forward Surgical Capabilities, and Prolonged Casualty Care. In every priority, JTS publications including DeployedMedicine.com and JTS.health.mil were listed as the primary resources to the allied nations for developing their own combat casualty care programs.
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