Navy Medicine Community – Navy Medicine

A Rewarding Path to Global Health Engagement

By Lt. Cmdr. Arcelia Wicker, MSC, deputy director, Navy Medicine Office of Global Health Engagement Recently, while flying over the Pacific to Papua New Guinea to help lay the groundwork for a global health engagement project, I reflected on my 18-year career in the Navy, starting as a steam engineer onboard a dock landing ship and then as a fire …

A Message from the Navy Surgeon General: Readiness, Health and Partnerships

KUANTAN, Malaysia (Aug. 4, 2016) Vice Adm. C. Forrest Faison III, surgeon general of the Navy, salutes sideboys as he arrives aboard hospital ship USNS Mercy (T-AH 19). During his visit, he met with Pacific Partnership 2016 personnel, toured Mercy and held an Admiral's Call where he answered questions from the crew. Mercy is in Kuantan in support of Pacific Partnership 2016, the first time Mercy and Pacific Partnership have visited Malaysia. During the mission stop, partner nations work side-by-side with local military and civilian organizations in a search and rescue exercise, civil engineering projects, community relation events and subject matter expert exchanges. (U.S. Navy photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Hank Gettys/Released)

By Vice Adm. Forrest Faison, Navy surgeon general Shipmates, Navy Medicine is dedicated to the best readiness and health in the world and it is our mission to keep Sailors, Marines and their family ready, healthy and on the job. As your 38th Navy surgeon general, I understand the significance of quality care and the increasing role patients play in …

The Mosquito Fighters: A Short History of Mosquitoes in the Navy – Part 3

Naval Hospital Widow’s Island, Maine, ca. 1900. For much of the nineteenth century patients suffering mosquito-borne disease would be sent to a special quarantine
facility for treatment. In 1887, the U.S. Navy opened a quarantine hospital on Widow’s Island for Yellow Fever patients. Soon seen as obsolete, the hospital
closed in 1901 without ever having treated a patient. The hospital was ceded to the state of Maine in 1903 where it was used as a psychiatric asylum.

By André B. Sobocinski, historian, BUMED “Dryness, coolness, fresh air, sunshine, cleanliness of body, clothes and bedding, good food, pure water, temperance, refreshing sleep, occupation exercise, cheerfulness, and contentment of mind…” ~A Recipe for Good Health by Medical Inspector Albert Gihon, USN, 1871 For much of the nineteenth century the United States was losing a war to an overlooked threat. …

The Mosquito Fighters: A Short History of Mosquitoes in the Navy – Part 1

By Andre B. Sobocinski, historian, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery Over the course of the U.S. Navy’s history the mosquito has been a constant threat whose enduring swath of destruction far extends that of the Barbary Pirates, the Imperial Japanese fleet or even German U-boats. From the Navy’s first conflict – in the so-called Quasi-War with France (1797-1801) – our small …

I am Navy Medicine: Hospital Corpsman 1st Class Sarah Pacquette

By Hospital Corpsman 1st Class Sarah Pacquette, Walter Reed National Military Medical Center I have served in the Navy for 15 years, and proudly wear my Fleet Marine Force qualification pin on my uniform that signifies I’m qualified to serve with the United States Marine Corps. I’ve always had enormous respect for my grandfather, who served as a yeoman in …