[Congressional Record Volume 168, Number 150 (Monday, September 19, 2022)]
[Senate]
[Pages S4818-S4819]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




  50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE UNIFORMED SERVICES UNIVERSITY OF THE HEALTH 
                                SCIENCES

  Mr. VAN HOLLEN. Mr. President, throughout the past five decades, the 
Senate has recognized the important role of the Uniformed Services 
University of the Health Sciences--USUHS--in maintaining the health and 
readiness of our Nation's uniformed services. Today, I am proud to 
congratulate this fine institution, located in Bethesda, in my State of 
Maryland, on its 50th anniversary.
  Public Law 92-426 established USUHS in 1972 to ensure continuity and 
leadership for uniformed medicine. USUHS is our country's only Federal 
graduate and undergraduate degree-granting health sciences university 
in support of the Department of Defense--DOD--and the Nation. Since its 
founding, USUHS has graduated more than 11,000 military health 
professionals.
  USUHS has met every goal and mission envisioned by the founders of 
this remarkable institution. It is the only institute of higher 
learning to provide a unique military curriculum that educates and 
trains leaders in healthcare relevant to the military mission. USUHS 
provides its students a rigorous healthcare education combined with 
equally demanding training in leadership, military medicine, and public 
health. Students learn in a variety of settings, including modern 
classrooms and laboratories, a renowned simulation center, major 
military hospitals and clinics, summer operational experiences with 
military units, and progressively challenging field exercises. Students 
leave USUHS prepared to care in any setting, from a modern tertiary 
care hospital or primary care clinic, to the sickbay of a warship, the 
cargo bay of a critical care air transport flight, an operating room in 
a combat support hospital, or a treatment tent in a refugee camp.
  The USUHS Hebert School of Medicine, compared with any other U.S. 
medical school, contributes the highest number of physician accessions 
to the military services. USUHS alumni comprise 25 percent of the 
Military Health System physician force. An independent analysis of 
USUHS conducted by the Institute for Defense Analysis found that, on a 
value basis that factors in retention, USUHS may offer the highest 
return on physician education and training investments. They concluded 
that USUHS graduates deployed more than 250 percent longer than other 
accession sources--an average of 731 days compared to 266--have higher 
proportions of officers in the mid- and senior-rank levels compared to 
other accession sources, have higher representation in special 
operation units compared to other accession sources, and attain a 
higher percentage of specialty board certification compared to other 
accession sources. The school's graduate education programs in 
biomedical sciences, public health, clinical psychology, health 
professions education, and health policy have granted more than 1,000 
graduate degrees. Many of these alumni are now serving as key leaders 
in the Federal Government, academia, research foundations and 
laboratories, and in public health. Throughout the COVID-19 pandemic, 
USUHS School of Medicine alumni supported under-resourced communities, 
as well as national and global preparedness and response efforts, and 
were involved in evaluating new COVID-19 test methods, including those 
that received emergency use authorization approvals. The USUHS Daniel 
K. Inouye Graduate School of Nursing educates advanced practice nurses 
for the Federal Nursing Chiefs to provide the Nation with the highest 
quality graduate nurse clinicians, scientists, scholars, and leaders 
dedicated to Federal service, health readiness, and global engagement. 
Its nurse anesthesia program is consistently ranked among the top four 
in the country by U.S. News & World Report's Best Graduate School 
rankings, which also ranks the school's doctor of nursing practice 
degree program in the top 13 percent in the country. The USUHS Graduate 
School of Nursing has received multiple national recognitions and was 
acknowledged by the National League for nursing twice, as a Center of 
Excellence for enhanced student learning and faculty development. The 
USUHS postgraduate dental college's 19 postgraduate dental specialties 
and 26 postgraduate year-1 programs ensure that military dentists 
attain advanced skill sets beyond those acquired upon graduation from 
dental school. These advanced dental skills are essential to meeting 
the needs of warfighters before, during, and after military operations. 
The university's college of allied health sciences awards undergraduate 
college credit and degrees to enlisted medical professionals and 
trainees and has graduated more than 3,500 students from its 23 
programs since its inception.
  Over the past five decades, USUHS has played a critical role in 
national defense, in times of war and peace. USUHS graduates continue 
to be integral to combat deployments, humanitarian missions, disaster 
response, and public health crisis response throughout the world. USUHS 
provides its expertise to DOD and the Nation in global health, TBI, 
PTSD, disaster medicine, neuroscience, and human performance. During 
the recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the Military Health System 
achieved the highest rate of survival from battlefield injury in the 
history of the world. USUHS graduates and faculty have not only made 
important contributions to clinical practice in combat environments 
around the world, but to medical science and research, benefiting both 
the military and the public at large.
  The value of the university's science is increasingly recognized by 
the National Institutes of Health--NIH--and other funders; USUHS is 
ranked 80 of

[[Page S4819]]

900 U.S. institutions of higher learning, putting it in the top 10th 
percentile in total research and development expenditures by the 
National Science Foundation. USUHS researchers generate high-impact 
military-relevant discoveries and products to protect the health of our 
forces and assure the national health security of the United States. 
Since its founding, USUHS has filed more than 2,273 patents for 
research discoveries and technology inventions. Its faculty have been 
the recipient of eight consecutive Federal Laboratory Consortium 
Technology Transfer Awards for their ground-breaking work.
  USUHS's centers focus on advancing research, education, and public 
health. Its National Center for Disaster Medicine and Public Health has 
been at the forefront of the national Stop the Bleed and First Aid for 
Severe Trauma campaigns to encourage bystanders and high school 
students. USUHS was designated as the Nation's first National Stop the 
Bleed Campus in 2019. The USUHS Center for Biotechnology--4DBio3--uses 
3D printers to produce military-relevant medical products in extreme 
austere environments for the benefit of our warfighters. It has also 
developed technology to generate red blood cells which would allow for 
whole blood transfusion and could become the answer to blood shortages 
on the battlefield, other remote locations, and in hospitals. The 
Surgical Critical Care Initiative at USUHS created an application to 
accurately predict whether a patient, who has just been admitted to the 
emergency room, would need a massive blood transfusion. USUHS 
researchers and trauma surgeons have also led the development of 
knowledge, skills, and abilities metrics that are being used to inform 
changes to patient workflow, increasing surgical workloads, and, 
ultimately, enhancing readiness within the Military Health System. 
These KSA metrics have proven vital to measuring military surgeons' 
individual clinical skills readiness, while also providing data to 
leadership, increasing clinical readiness-generating workload within 
the MHS.
  USUHS has long met and exceeded the original intent of its founders 
to educate a career cadre of physicians to support our Nation's 
military. Over the past 50 years, USUHS has contributed immeasurably to 
the health and future of our Nation, through its stellar education and 
training programs, its innovative research, and its development of the 
next generation of military medical leaders and scientists. I am 
delighted to recognize and congratulate the remarkable students, 
faculty, and staff of USUHS for their outstanding work and commitment 
to serving our country, and my best wishes for a happy golden 
anniversary to our Nation's Uniformed Services University of the Health 
Sciences.

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