FORT LEONARD WOOD, Mo. -- During his 27-year Army career, Col. (Dr.) Peter E. Nielsen has served overseas four times including two combat deployments to Iraq.
Now, Nielsen moves from the Army Medical Department's Western Regional Medical Command, at Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington, to take command of the General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital here, replacing Col. Marie Dominguez, the current hospital commander.
A graduate of the U.S. Army War College and the Command and General Staff College, Nielsen is a family man with three children, and is board certified in obstetrics and gynecology, and maternal-fetal medicine.
Dominguez is headed for Carlisle Barracks, in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, to attend the U.S. Army War College. From there she is slated to take command of Martin Army Hospital at Fort Benning, Georgia.
Nielsen takes command of GLWACH with a list of capabilities which have dramatically increased here over the last few years under Dominguez's watch. The list is long, but some major items include:
• Joint Commission Reaccreditation. Inspectors specifically noted that the organization takes care of patients exceptionally well and goes above and beyond the standards. Our Immunization Clinic received their Gold Star Rating.
• Level 3 Patient-Centered Medical home status--the highest level of recognition awarded by the National Committee for Quality Assurance--for both the Leonard Wood Medical Home and the Ozark Family-Centered Medical Home. This recognition empowers both Army medicine and patients to make informed health care decisions based on quality. Recognition also demonstrates that both the hospital and its off-post clinic value quality health care delivery and the latest clinical protocols to ensure patients receive the best care at the right time.
• Awarded the 2012 Department of Defense Patient Safety Award, the only Army facility to receive the coveted annual Military Health System award.
• Decreased pharmacy wait times by 45 percent
• Opened Behavioral Health Service Line counseling and medical services to all enrolled beneficiaries
• Began performing GI procedures in the operating room.
• Began performing bariatric surgery
• Wireless hotspots have been installed for both in and outpatient patient customers to connect with family members during their hospital visits.
• Established "Peek-a-Baby" capability, which took Internet connectivity to another level here when new mothers and babies must be separated for specialized care throughout Missouri. Video and audio are transmitted from a camera mounted above the newborn to a hospital laptop computer used by new mothers.
Nielsen is a graduate of Texas A&M University and received his commission through the Health Professions Scholarship Program at the University of Texas Health Science Center, San Antonio, Texas, with a degree in Medicine in 1987.
His academic appointments include Professor of Obstetrics and Gynecology at the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences, Bethesda, Maryland, and the University of Washington School of Medicine, Seattle, Washington. He has been the Obstetrics and Gynecology Consultant to the Surgeon General since 2003 and previously served as Residency Program Director and Chair, Department of Obstetrics and Gynecology, Madigan Army Medical Center. Nielsen's most recent assignment was serving as Assistant Chief of Staff for Clinical Operations, Western Regional Medical Command, Joint Base Lewis McChord, Washington.
Nielsen will hit the ground running July 8 following his Change of Command ceremony at 8 a.m. He is scheduled to host the hospital's Healthcare Consortium, a hospital town hall meeting open to beneficiaries, allowing them to provide input into process improvements and health care delivery policy for the organization.
The consortium meeting is at 2:30 p.m. in the hospital classroom on the second Tuesday of each month.
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