Deb Fischer Presses Military Healthcare Experts On Hurdles In Military Healthcare Training

yesterday

During a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing held before the Congressional recess, Sen. Deb Fischer (R-NE) questioned experts about healthcare training in the military services.

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Transcript

00:00Fischer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Thank you all for being here today. I really appreciate the

00:07information that you're giving us and also the concern you have with the direction that we

00:14aren't headed yet. In the NDAA for FY 2020, a pilot program was established to assess the National

00:26Disaster Medical System, the NDMS, and hopefully that it would increase not just capability but

00:35also capacity within that. In a conflict, you know, we've touched on that already. We have

00:40to be able to quickly disperse and absorb casualties throughout the United States.

00:47Dr. Friedrichs, why is it so important for the NDMS to maintain this surge capacity?

00:53Senator Fischer, first, thank you for the role that you and your colleagues from Nebraska played in

01:01championing this and highlighting this. It's important because the military health system

01:06does not have the capacity to care for every casualty coming back. We don't have the capacity

01:10to care for the people in peacetime right now. So to think that somehow we can do this on our own

01:16is another mistaken belief. During the Cold War, we recognized that if our nation went to war,

01:22we would go to war together and that we would do it with an integrated system with the DOD,

01:28the Veterans Health Administration, and civilian partners. We must rejuvenate the NDMS,

01:33not let it continue to atrophy. So what's the next step in this pilot program? So the next step

01:41is to make this not a pilot program but to reiterate that this is indeed the intent of

01:46Congress, that the NDMS is the framework in which we integrate our ability to deal with either

01:53surges in military patients or, in the event of a natural disaster, surges in civilian patients.

02:00But that is the framework. A subset of that are the RESPECT centers, which you're very familiar

02:05with, the Regional Emerging Special Pathogen Centers that are designed to take care of patients

02:10exposed to or treated, infected with high consequence infectious diseases. And another

02:17subset of that is the trauma system that Dr. Cannon so nicely described. We need your help

02:24to articulate in law that we must work as a nation and as a team. We're short 300,000 nurses

02:32nationally. The projections are we will be short 130,000 doctors by 2035. There is no way that we

02:40can do this individually. We must do it together, and I urge you to codify the NDMS pilot and make

02:45that the intent moving forward. Dr. Cannon, Dr. Robb, anything to add on that? Senator, I would

02:53just advocate for what my colleague General Friedrichs just said, but we need to put our

02:58foot on the gas. We don't have five years, 10 years, 20 years. We need the solution really now.

03:06Dr. Robb? Yeah, I concur with both their comments, and going back, the fact that we dual purpose

03:15these assets, these expensive assets, to solve problems both on the military and the civilian

03:21sector, but they're mutually synergistic. So absolutely, we need to press forward. Thank you.

03:26Dr. Friedrichs, you mentioned the University of Nebraska Medical Center and working with

03:32an academic institution. Can you explain to the committee the benefits of those partnerships with

03:40academic institutions in particular and what that can yield for the military health system?

03:47Thank you very much, Senator Fischer. So the first benefit is we share and exchange information.

03:53University of Nebraska has established, without a doubt, one of the premier programs for treating

03:59casualties or patients who are exposed to highly contagious infectious diseases,

04:03and they've got remarkable on-site training, which they built in partnership with the United

04:08States Air Force. This is a great example of a military-civilian partnership in which the

04:12exchange of ideas improves care, both for military and civilian patients. But the other thing that we

04:18can learn from our civilian partners is something that I offer to the committee to consider. The

04:23CHIP-IN Act, which was originally passed to allow for blending of funding to build new VA facilities,

04:31should be expanded to include the DOD. We cannot afford to keep building duplicative facilities,

04:37and the CHIP-IN Act was a great way to allow the blending of federal, state, local, and philanthropic

04:43funds so that we can most efficiently care for this diverse patient population. Again, I commend

04:48the University of Nebraska for the pioneering work that they've done in showing what a good

04:52mil-civ partnership looks like. Thank you for the shout-out on the CHIP-IN Act. That bill was

04:58written in my office, so thank you very much. Dr. Cannon, as a professor of surgery, do you have

05:04anything to add on that? I would just comment that these mil-civ partnership sites can be incredible

05:11assets for force generation, for building up that next generation, those future leaders in surgery

05:18and other combat-relevant specialties. These are epicenters of academic excellence where

05:24we can truly inspire that next generation. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

Deb Fischer Presses Military Healthcare Experts On Hurdles In Military Healthcare Training

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