In 2013, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs, Dr. Jonathan Woodson, told the Defense Health Agency: “So if war is the dark side of the human experience where humanity fails, medicine has always provided some hope and light.”
When we speak of war, we often talk more about the lives lost, not the lives saved. War, however, has played a fundamental role in accelerating advances in medical innovation. In fact, many of the world's leading healthcare innovations come not from top U.S. hospitals, but from the United States military.
Military physicians have played a role in most medical breakthroughs - everything from treatments for infection and infectious disease, revolutions in trauma care, and innovations in telemedicine and prosthetic technology. While these advancements may have originated on the battlefield in the treatment of injured soldiers, the benefits have served all of humanity.
At the same time, these advances keep the United States military at full physical force, allowing it to continue to engage in long-standing conflicts that are often more deadly for civilians than the troops. Soldiers can now physically survive severe injuries; this also takes a toll on their emotional and physical health, and there's been a noticeable increase in post-traumatic stress disorders (PTSD).
So, is war good for medicine? How have the military medical breakthroughs benefited society - and what's next on the horizon? And, after years of continuous combat, are we offering our soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines the best care we can or is there more we can do?