I had already posted that article in the metro thread.
Here's another one in today's E-N.
By Sig Christenson - Express-News
The launching of a new era is usually wrapped in lots of pomp and circumstance, but the Army and Air Force kept things relatively simple Monday as they broke ground on a $724 million expansion of Brooke Army Medical Center.
The Air Force and Army surgeon generals made brief speeches before a crowd of 200 and then donned white plastic hard hats. Standing in front of a long rectangular wooden box in a parking lot outside BAMC, they drove silver-plated spades into thick brown earth. The Army Medical Command Band played a medley of service songs and then, after a breezy half-hour, the show was over.
Though low-key, the groundbreaking ceremony heralds a new day for military medicine in San Antonio. The BAMC expansion is the biggest project yet on Fort Sam — part of $2 billion in construction around town driven by the 2005 base closure round.
“I think that much construction is enormous,” Mayor Phil Hardberger said. “It will certainly be a multiple of the $2 billion that is being put in because once you put that much money into the economy it circulates around and reaches well outside the construction community.”
There's more beyond that bottom line. Everything changes with the turning of a little dirt, right down to the way the Air Force and Army train their recruits and provide medical care to troops and civilians.
BAMC will grow by nearly 760,000 square feet, absorbing Wilford Hall Medical Center's inpatient care and Level 1 trauma center. The hospitals will get new names, San Antonio Military Medical Center North and South, and distinctly new missions that will see Air Force, Army and Navy medical personnel working together more than they do today.
“Quite candidly, these warriors down here in front of us .... every one of them will tell you it's of no consequence or interest to them what color uniform takes care of them,” said Lt. Gen. (Dr.) Eric Schoomaker, the Army surgeon general. “All they want to know is they're getting the very best care possible and, frankly, San Antonio's doing that for us.”
The 2005 Defense Base Closure and Realignment Commission ordered the changes as part of a larger overall move to create “joint” military operations. The idea is to save money and become more efficient.
The two hospitals today offer many of the same services. Wilford Hall logs 140 emergency room visits, six births, 35 surgeries and 9,285 lab procedures — every day. BAMC recorded 123 daily ER visits, 58 surgeries and 3,039 lab procedures.
When SAMMC North goes into business in 2011, it will handle all ER visits, births, surgeries and lab procedures. Fort Sam Houston also will be home to the Medical Education & Training Campus, where 32,000 Army, Navy and Air Force medics will be trained each year. SAMMC South will specialize in outpatient clinics and urgent care for Lackland AFB recruits.
“San Antonio has long been a mainstay in Air Force medicine. San Antonio will remain a mainstay in Air Force medicine,” said Lt. Gen. (Dr.) James Roudebush, the Air Force surgeon general. “Nothing will be lost, nothing will be diminished. In fact, my view is I think it will be better.”
As the Army and Air Force transform their medical systems here, Bexar County is preparing to expand University Hospital and University Health Center-Downtown. Commissioners have approved an $899 million expansion of both hospitals, in part to meet the region's growing need for trauma care.
“We're investing as much as they are or more. We made that decision obviously for several different reasons — one, we're handling 70,000 emergency cases for a hospital that is built for 35,000, and so we thought the timing was important,” said Bexar County Judge Nelson Wolff.
“We're known as Military City, U.S.A.,” said retired Air Force Col. Bill Rasco, president and CEO of the Greater San Antonio Hospital Council. “But I think we're going to potentially earn the name Medical City, U.S.A. because of the presence of the Department of the Defense, and also the presence of the Veterans Administration here and the new polytrauma center that is being built adjacent to the VA here.”