WASHINGTON—Yvette Roubideaux, MD, became the first woman to lead the Indian Health Service when she was sworn in as the agency’s director on May 12.

No one who goes to the hospital expects to acquire a drug-resistant infection during his or her stay.

WASHINGTON—Glaucoma is a group of diseases that can damage the eye’s optic nerve and result in vision loss and blindness. It is a leading cause of vision loss in the U.S. While there is no cure for glaucoma, with early diagnosis, the eye can be protected from vision loss.

WASHINGTON—Without a comprehensive eye exam, glaucoma, macular degeneration, and many other conditions that destroy vision may not be caught early enough to prevent further damage to the eye. “The reasons for comprehensive eye exams is to identify conditions and problems at the earliest stage and render treatment to avoid an impact on people’s lives and their abilities to do their jobs and to function,” according to Cdr. Kent Blade, MC, USN, an ophthalmologist at the Naval Medical Center San Diego.

WASHINGTON—The President asked for $47.4 billion to meet the Department of Defense’s health care needs for FY 2010. A top DoD official told a subcommittee last month that the budget request fully funds the agency’s health care programs. “All of the requirements of both the service medical departments and the Tricare Management Activity were funded by the Secretary. We do not anticipate any additional requirements at this time,” Allen Middleton, acting principal deputy assistant secretary defense for Health Affairs, told the House Armed Services Committee’s Military Personnel Subcommittee.

WASHINGTON—Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs S. Ward Casscells, MD, spent his last morning on the job at the Walter Reed Army Medical Center where he visited various medical departments and spoke with patients and staff.

ARLINGTON—Since 2002, child mortality in Afghanistan has been reduced by about 25%, and basic health care services have increased greatly, but there is still more work to be done to increase the health status of the people, according to Afghan officials. “I believe that we have made significant progress in Afghanistan toward building a capable health system,” said Dr. S. M. Amin Fatimie, Minister of Public Health for Afghanistan, at a conference hosted last month by the office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs in partnership with the National Defense University’s Near East South Asia Center for Strategic Studies. “But we really have a long way to go.”

WASHINGTON—AHLTA, the Department of Defense’s $4 million electronic medical record system, continues to be difficult for military physicians to use, according to top military health leaders who spoke at a House Armed Services subcommittee hearing at the end of March.

WASHINGTON—Mild traumatic brain injuries are being overdiagnosed in returning troops, according to a study by Army TBI researchers in the April 16, 2009, issue of the New England Journal of Medicine.

WASHINGTON—Donna J. Mazyck, a former high school nurse, recalled an experience in which a student asked her if she could weigh herself.