University presidents are asked each year — by their boards, faculty, alumni and others — about their goals and priorities for the coming year. Answering these questions is rarely a simple proposition. Each audience may harbor hopes that their priorities, whether they are an expansion of research laboratory space, new recreational facilities, better dorms or increased visibility of the institution, are at the top of the president’s list. Even the most thoughtfully constructed list cannot satisfy everyone. 

When asked these questions, I am mindful that, unlike many of my colleagues, I do not have to address the ranking of athletic teams or the performance of the endowment, but I am most grateful that I do not have to answer questions about keeping tuition down. We do not charge tuition. I am not concerned about funding the university on the backs of student debt. In this age when many talented and dedicated students cannot afford to pursue advanced health-sciences degrees, our students receive an education free of financial debt but linked to service in caring for our troops and their families. This great privilege, for me as a university president and for our students, is the core mission and priority of USU. It is my first and highest goal to ensure that USU sustains and increases its capacity to educate the best and brightest to care for those in harm’s way.

This goal has a number of key components which include:

• Recruiting and retaining faculty who are at the cutting edge of their field
• Sustaining and growing the research base essential to health sciences education and advancement
• Nurturing the university’s unique focus on militarily relevant research and treatment in such areas as tropical and infectious disease, trauma care, post-traumatic stress (PTS) and traumatic brain injury (TBI)
• Attracting a highly qualified, diverse pool of applicants to USU’s educational programs in medicine, advanced practice nursing, advanced dentistry, public health, tropical medicine and hygiene, medical and clinical psychology and the biomedical sciences
• Ensuring that the institution’s capital resources are well matched to mission and well and prudently managed, especially with  the public’s money
• Positioning the institution to meet new challenges 

Groundbreaking Collaborations

Charles Rice, MD Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences President

The vision of the MHS leadership for the new WRNMMC —of a first-class academic medical center — relies on USU to provide the educational and research foundation essential to that vision. We have an unprecedented national opportunity to expand and create new and groundbreaking collaborations among federal departments and agencies, especially the National Institutes of Health (NIH) to advance public health. For as long as wars have been fought, infectious disease has been a challenge. The long-standing partnership between USU and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease (NIAID) capitalizes on the strengths of the MHS to develop effective and safe measures to prevent and treat the scourge of infection. 

One example of new challenges is instructive: TBI and PTS have been far more prominent in current conflict than in any time in earlier history. USU is deeply engaged with scientists at the NIH in fundamental and translational research and treatment for both of these “signature” injuries to our troops. USU has partnered with WRNMMC and several institutes of the NIH and the NIH Clinical Center to pursue cutting-edge research, diagnosis and innovative clinical care, spanning the spectrum from prevention to rehabilitation. 

Another such opportunity involves closer collaboration with the NIH, specifically the National Cancer Institute (NCI). USU is part of a working group under the Joint Task Force National Capital Region Medical, which is standing up a comprehensive cancer center with the ultimate goal of seeking NCI designation — awarded to only the nation’s top cancer centers that meet a stringent set of requirements representing the best in depth and breadth of cancer treatment, research and outreach. The vision is to provide the best and most-advanced care to our patients and their families, as well as to base this care on cutting-edge research. The MHS, with its extraordinary electronic patient-record system, extensive and historic tissue repository and diverse population, brings unparalleled potential to such a collaboration.