JOINT BASE LEWIS-MCCHORD, Wash.-- Public Health Command Region-West, also know as PHCR-West, officially inactivated in a ceremony Sept. 21 at French Theater at Joint Base Lewis-McChord (JBLM).
The ceremony marked the completion of reorganization for public health within the Army Medical Department, or AMEDD. In compliance with Operations Order 15-08, USAMEDCOM Reorganization, 15 regional functional commands transformed into four multi-disciplinary Regional Health Commands, or RHCs. Now included in the RHC structure are Dental Health Command, Warrior Transition Command and Public Health Command.
This shift reduced the number of Public Health Command regions from five to four, eliminating PHCR-West and realigning its districts, assets and personnel under the remaining commands. The majority of these elements are now under PHC-Pacific, led by Commander Col. David W. Seed. Some personnel from JBLM now report to PHC-Central or PHC-Atlantic commands. To date, no PHCR-West assets have moved to PHC-Europe, though some personnel have moved to new assignments located in Europe.
Two of PHCR-West's three veterinary districts, Public Health Command Districts, or PHCDs -- San Diego and JBLM, to include the west coast states of Washington, Oregon, California and Alaska -- have moved to PHC-Pacific. PHCD-Fort Carson has shifted to PHC-Central.
With its change of command in July, PHC-Pacific moved its headquarters from Camp Zama, Japan, to Tripler Army Medical Center in Hawaii to locate its center of operations alongside that of RHC-Pacific.
The inactivation ceremony was PHCR-West's final function as a command. Interim Commander Lt. Col. Jennifer Cummings and interim senior noncommissioned officer Master Sgt. Adrienne Campuzano rolled and cased PHCR-West's flag.
"From day one, I have been truly impressed with the level of expertise and capabilities of the team at Region-West whose hard work and achievements should be recognized," Cummings said. "From training and assistance visits, to arthropod identification, to lab analyses, to food protection and sanitation missions, to veterinary services, the Region-West team has been instrumental in countering environmental, occupational, and disease threats to health, fitness and readiness."
Cummings noted that she learned of the transformation that inactivated Region-West as she traveled across the country to take over the executive officer position with the command.
Of the planning, preparation, and execution of transformation, she stated, "Throughout all the turbulence and unpredictability, the team steadfastly maintained their professionalism and dedication. And while all of these accomplishments are noteworthy, it's the people that truly make up an organization."
The ceremony also brought PHC-Pacific's command team, Col. David W. Seed and Sgt. Maj. Roosevelt Nettles, Jr., to JBLM as Seed served as the ceremony's reviewing officer. Having assumed command in late July, this was Seed's introduction to most of the PHC personnel stationed at JBLM.
"U.S. Military medicine is the best in the world and takes the hard work and dedication of the entire team, doctors, nurses, medics, public health professionals and administrators. Going forward, we will maintain our commitment to excellence and to each other. We will build on the legacy of Public Health Command Region West and ensure that when our fellow Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines need us, we'll stand and deliver," he said.
As PHCR-West's flag marched off the stage with Madigan Army Medical Center's Color Guard to the sound of the 56th Army Band Brass Quintet, its chapter in Army Medicine's story is complete.
The reorganization allows all medical entities to work in closer cooperation to meet the mission. The recognition that public health concepts are central to the health and functionality of the Army is hardly new.
When Baron von Steuben arrived at Valley Forge in early 1778, he established field sanitation practices that would be the standard for the next century and a half. These principles may have been transformative in their innovation to the fledgling Continental Army, but clean water, wholesome food, sanitation, disease and injury prevention, and other sound public health practices have always been vital to warfighter readiness. Similarly, Gen. George Washington recognized the importance of veterinary expertise when he directed the raising of a regiment of horses with a farrier in 1776.
Though public health and veterinary expertise were considered vital from the Army's earliest days, their more formal inclusion in Army structure all came within the last 100 years. The National Defense Act of 1916 established the Army Veterinary Corps. With the nation's involvement in World War I, the Vet Corps grew rapidly -- from a roster of 57 veterinarians when war was declared in April 1917 to 2,313 officers within the next 18 months.
Public health found its footing as a distinct entity within the Army with the formation of the Army Industrial Hygiene Laboratory (AIHL) in 1942. Again, combat involvement in a foreign theater served as an instigating factor in its development. The AIHL was established with a primary mission of aiding the war effort by conducting occupational health surveys and investigations within the Department of Defense industrial production base.
Through numerous iterations, both entities developed and expanded their missions to include all aspects of animal, environmental and non-clinical human health. This "One Health" concept became the guiding vision for PHC as Medical Command joined the Army Center for Health Promotion and Preventive Medicine and the Veterinary Command in 2009.
Achieving full operational capability in 2011, PHC was headquartered at Aberdeen Proving Ground, Md., and consisted of five regional commands: PHCR-North at Fort George G. Meade in Maryland; PHCR-South at Joint Base San Antonio in Texas; PHCR-Pacific at Camp Zama in Japan; PHCR-Europe at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany; and PHCR-West at JBLM in Washington. PHCR-West supported 19 states west of the Mississippi River and a small section of northwestern Texas to include Fort Bliss in El Paso.
This large geographical area of responsibility presented the technical experts of PHCR-West the opportunity to develop a diverse knowledge base. From supporting installations in West Nile Virus detection and eradication efforts to assisting Naval shipyards with industrial hygiene considerations of their operations to training units in field preventive medicine as they prepared to deploy to Iraq and Afghanistan to preparing new Veterinary Corps officers for leadership in the First Year Graduate Veterinary Education (FYGVE) program, PHCR-West provided public health support that impacted the whole Army and its missions worldwide.
The mission for PHCR-West focused on enhancing readiness by providing public health leadership and services to counter animal, food, environmental, occupational, and disease threats, to prevent disease, disability, and premature death at 200 installations across the western states, including Alaska, and by directly supporting Active Duty, Guard and Reserve Soldiers, as well as Navy and Air Force units, their families and other beneficiaries. Its vision concentrated on being the world class Center of Excellence in the western United States for the systematic prevention of environmental, occupational, and disease threats to public health in our regional military communities.
The expertise within the Region's divisions - Environmental Health Engineering, Occupational Health Sciences, Health Risk Management, Laboratory Sciences, and Veterinary Services -- assisted installations, medical treatment facilities, and deploying units counter environmental, occupational, and disease threats to health, fitness, and readiness. During an average year, PHCR-West personnel conducted more than two dozen of each: preventive medicine training events; assistance visits for water, waste, and pest management; and Industrial Hygiene site visits. It identified over twenty thousand arthropods for disease detection, tested nearly twelve thousand samples in the lab for mosquito-borne, tick-borne, and rodent-borne diseases of military significance. It conducted more than seven hundred food vulnerability assessments at forty-six installations, in excess of six hundred commercial sanitation food protection audits at over four hundred facilities, and it provided clinical veterinary medicine at forty-seven locations for military working dogs and other government-owned animals as well as privately-owned animals of service members.
During its existence, PCHR-West stood up the JBLM First Year Graduate Veterinary Education Program in fiscal year 2012. One of seven locations approved by MEDCOM, the McChord clinic benefits from the four to six interns each year who develop their newly-learned skills caring for military working dogs and privately-owned animals under the supervision of two permanent instructors and a host of adjunct and mentor support. Graduates of the program take their place as Vet Corps Officers in charge of clinics and leaders who enhance Public Health Command's One Health mission. As four new interns arrive this month, they seek to join the 21 officers who have completed the program at JBLM.
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