· Only genetics research center in Defense Department
· One of the largest medical centers in the Air Force
· One of three Air Force hospitals with clinical investigations
It’s well known that Keesler Air Force Base is home to one of the largest medical centers in the Air Force and provides care for thousands of Defense Department patients.
But how many know Keesler’s medical center is home to the DoD’s only medical genetics center? With $2 million worth of special equipment, the Air Force Medical Genetics Center performs 1,100 cytogenetic studies and 18,000 molecular genetics tests every year, and is a center of excellence and reference for DoD.
Col. David Garrison, deputy commander of the 81st Medical Group that oversees the Keesler medical campus, is unabashedly proud of the distinction.
“Keesler has always been and will continue to be a hotbed for research and development,” said Garrison. “We’ve always been one of the first ones to raise our hands to try new things here.”
Indeed, the medical center at Keesler is one of only three Air Force medical facilities with a formal clinical investigations program in a dedicated research facility.
The organization
The 81st Medical Group at Keesler has 1,600 military and civilian personnel and uses 200 contractors who provide services ranging from maintenance to highly specialized surgeons to augment the staff.
The medical group campus within Keesler is 88 acres with 900,000 square feet of healthcare facilities spread out over nine buildings, including Keesler Medical Center. It has an annual operating budget of $78 million, but over the last few years the medical group has poured an additional $106 million to rebuild in the wake of Hurricane Katrina.
The medical group has three missions: healthcare, deployment and training. Its primary mission is to maintain medical readiness for worldwide contingencies by providing healthcare for 11,000 active duty and 47,000 local beneficiaries in a 50-mile catchment area.
Healthcare mission
On a daily basis, the medical complex has 900 outpatient visits, 22 inpatient, three births, 400 radiology images procedures, 1,500 laboratory procedures, fills 6,000 prescriptions, has 90 emergency room visits, eight surgeries, and eight ambulatory procedures.
The medical center has seven newly-renovated surgery suites and opened a new Family Birthing Center unit in early 2007.
The Diagnostic Imaging Department has the only 3-Tesla MRI system in the Air Force, and the Keesler Warfighter Refractive Surgery Center is the Air Force’s flagship for laser eye surgery in the Southeast.
The 81st Medical Group commander, Brig. Gen. (Dr.) Dan Wyman, also oversees the Gulf Coast Multi-Service Market, which includes five military medical treatment facilities and two Coast Guard medical facilities between Mobile, Ala., and New Orleans, coordinating care for more than 75,000 eligible beneficiaries.
The medical center also serves as the Federal Coordinating Center for the National Disaster Medical System, the medical arm of the Federal Emergency Management Agency. It manages and maintains memorandums of agreement with 25 civilian medical facilities throughout the Mississippi Gulf Coast.
Perhaps one of the least known activities of Keesler’s medical group is the work in research, which includes clinical studies.
“Our one and only DoD genetics center is housed here at Keesler,” said Garrison, who notes the workload is fairly large. “They do roughly 20,000 cases a year. The focus there is DNA sequencing, chromosome analysis and gene testing. We do that for all of DoD here. We are the Lone Ranger for that one.”
Deployment mission
The 81st Medical Group is responsible for deploying an Expeditionary Medical Support hospital and support staff and is responsible for managing the second largest mobility mission in the Air Force.
At any given time, several hundred people associated with the medical group are rotating in and out of Keesler, going to battle zones or on medical deployment for training missions to places like Costa Rica, Honduras and El Salvador.
Garrison said virtually all military members from the 81st are subject to deployment, depending on the need.
Training mission
“Here at the medical center we have our own training mission. We have two physician graduate medical education programs,” said Garrison. “The programs are for internal medicine and general surgery and we are working hard to restore physician residencies in pediatrics and OB/Gyn.”
Before Katrina the center was graduating about 100 a year. The length of the training varies, with five years for surgery and four for pediatrics. The target is to get back to the pre-Katrina level.
“For the dentists, we have three residency programs: the one-year Advanced Education in General Dentistry and General Practice Residency programs, which provide advanced training above that which was attained in dental school, and a two-year Endodontic Residency, with the second predominantly clinical year of study spent at Keesler.”
There are also nine enlisted training programs for pharmacy technicians, radiology and lab workers, nuclear medicine technicians, medical service technicians and more. The classes run up to 39 weeks. The center graduated 288 phase II enlisted personnel last year, and the program is still growing.
The center also trains nurses new to the Air Force.
Community
Garrison said he believes the medical team is highly integrated with the surrounding community.
He said that if you checked with the medical staff at hospitals and clinics along the coast, you would find many who may have done their residency at Keesler Medical Center. Others who are retired military and came back include nurses, surgeons and others with an Air Force medical background.
One of the reasons that the medical group is so much a part of the community is through the cooperative agreements Keesler has with many of the area’s institutions, including William Carey, the VA Hospital, the University of Mississippi, Gulfport Memorial Hospital, Biloxi Regional and more. Garrison said Keesler has a particularly close relationship with the VA in Biloxi, and together they form a DoD center of excellence.
