Managing health services support to military operations

This is a submission for a PhD by portfolio on the subject of managing health services support to military operations. It is based upon my prior published work supported by an ‘action research’ analysis of the application of this prior knowledge to my experiences from spending a year in the South of Afghanistan from October 2009 to November 2010. The submission is structured around three thematic areas; medical planning to support military operations, management of military medical operations and international military medical engagement with indigenous health sectors. The submission presents evidence for my contribution to original thinking in each of these thematic areas by means of a review of my published work, my application of these concepts in support of NATO operations in Afghanistan and evidence of the impact of these concepts in influencing other military organisations. The first theme area on medical planning to support military operations will be supported by 3 monographs. These will describe the context of medical support to military operations in the current security environment, the use of the ‘estimate’ process to develop a medical plan and the analytical process termed ‘the casualty estimate’. The second theme covers the management of military medical operations. This is the largest section and contains monographs on pre-hospital helicopter medical evacuation, aeromedical evacuation movement between hospitals, managing casualty flows, deployed hospital care, and quality assurance of the medical system. The final theme covers international military medical engagement with medical support systems for indigenous security forces and indigenous civilian health systems. The closing section of this submission reflects on my two tours in Afghanistan comparing my recent experiences with my views at the end of my first tour in 2006/07. My whole thesis provides evidence of my considerable personal learning from my experiences managing medical support to military operations. This section will highlight how I have tried to share this experience both personally and across multiple stakeholder organisations to ensure my observations can be converted into lessons learned.EThOS - Electronic Theses Online ServiceGBUnited Kingdo