MHS Message - Military Health System in 2014 and beyond Published Sept. 18, 2013 WASHINGTON -- This month, the senior leadership of the Military Health System concluded a two day strategic planning offsite to provide direction for the future of our Military Health System in 2014 and beyond. Everyone is in agreement...we have the most extraordinary, unique and indispensable military health system in the world. And that is due to each and every one of you. We had the right mix of leaders in the room - from Health Affairs, the Offices of the Surgeons General, the soon-to-be-established Defense Health Agency, enhanced Multi-Service Market managers, MTF Commanders and several experts from the civilian community who provided helpful insights into building a more joint, integrated, cost efficient enterprise while maintaining service integrity, to support the more than 9.6 million beneficiaries served around the world. One common theme throughout the conference was the need for positive and engaged leadership to ensure the Military Health System remains the successful organization it is today. Everyone in this enterprise needs to know what our strategic goals are and how we are going to accomplish those goals. As we activate the Defense Health Agency on October 1st, we begin a movement to a stronger, more integrated, and more relevant joint enterprise that continues to produce positive results. That message cannot be communicated enough at all levels. In the meantime, however, we want to share with you some of the major takeaways from meeting . First, before we discuss the challenges facing our system, it's important to remember we are building upon a system with many strengths: * Unequaled success in our primary mission of medical readiness and combat casualty care. The historic achievements of military medicine in the operational theater are known by most of you - yet can never be forgotten. In combat, we have epitomized what a learning system can achieve. Through discipline and evidence-based rigor, we achieved the highest rate of survival from wounds, and the lowest rate of "Disease, Non-Battle Injuries" in the history of warfare. There is no other military medical system like ours in the world. This system of care we have created is vital, and it needs to be preserved. * Unity of effort. We are aligned across Health Affairs, the DHA and the Services on the goals and objectives of our system. And, we have created important new governance bodies that are increasing transparency of information and trust across organizations. * We can shape our own destiny and our own future. This future requires us to make strategic choices about where we put our precious resources - our people and our money. There is an urgency to these choices. If we don't make the difficult decisions, others will make them for us. Still, there are challenges. Not the least among these challenges is the significant budgetary pressure we face - not just within the Defense Department, but for all of government. And the sequestration and furloughs we experienced in 2013 signaled that this threat is not speculative. It's real, and it's present. We need to acknowledge that our direct care system needs fresh approaches to sustain our customer base. And, we need to make it more efficient. We must institute new policies, new common clinical and business processes, a standard approach to process improvement, and new customer-oriented strategies that increase the amount of care that occurs within our walls. Patients have choices. We need to be their preferred provider of choice. We also need to continue to value health over healthcare. We need to move away from being a system solely focused on units of production - and energize the innovation and talent within our system to improve the health of our population. We need to better harness technology to help us with this goal. In order to achieve these goals, we must have our leaders, at all levels, engaged in this process, aggressively communicate where we are heading and encourage their best ideas on how we can become a more efficient and effective enterprise. We are all excited about the future and how we will face any challenge as one dynamic, unified team within the Military Health System and we encourage you to be part of this process of change. We are all change leaders. Share your ideas with your chain of command to help us to continue to build the best medical enterprise in the world. We are all proud of the work you do each and every day and are very thankful we have such a talented and professional team taking care of our service members, their families and all who have served our country. Jonathan Woodson, Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs LTG Patricia Horoho, Surgeon General, United States Army VADM Matthew Nathan, Surgeon General, United States Navy Lt. Gen. Thomas Travis, Surgeon General, United States Air Force