[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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