Allied Health in Action
| Physical therapists make their mark in military medicine |  |
Physical therapists have a lot to offer in an environment where soldiers wear heavy gear, jump off trucks and planes, load missile launchers or need to learn how to walk again.
| Ann Petersen had earned her master's degree in physical therapy from Des Moines University in 1993 and was busily completing the Postprofessional Doctor of Physical Therapy Program. She had a well-established career, working with geriatric and brain-injured patients. Her two daughters were active second- and fourth-graders. When the nation called upon physical therapists to serve in the military, however, Petersen responded. |
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“I don't know what it is inside people to make them want to help. I just knew that if my country needed help, I would do it,” she says.
Pam Craven Reynolds, a 1991 graduate of the DMU physical therapy master's program, allowed her son – now a military helicopter pilot – to talk her into enlisting in the Army Reserve when she was in her early 40s. Commissioned at the same time, Reynolds and Petersen crossed paths for two weeks as physical therapists at Fort Hood, one of the world's largest military posts located in central Texas.
“You're getting people ready to go all the time,” says Reynolds, who used her experiences in industrial medicine and athletic training in treating soldiers. “A full-gear infantry guy is carrying an extra 120 pounds. Their shoulders and backs can bother them.”
Petersen also worked at William Beaumont Army Medical Center in El Paso, Texas, evaluating and treating soldiers before they were deployed and those coming home, as well as older veterans. She notes the important roles reservists have in the military medical corps.
“The government can't afford to pay staff when they're not needed, so they can draw upon the reservists when they are needed,” she says. “Reservists also bring compassion to the military's rigid structure of rank and order, and soldiers need that. They are so glad to have someone listen to them.”
Petersen recalls an Operation Desert Storm veteran – a colonel – who was in intensive care with an arrhythmic heartbeat. “We were trying to stabilize him. I was a captain so it wasn't appropriate for me as a female to touch him, but at that point, he's your patient. I touched his arm and we talked and laughed together.”
A male nurse entered the room and saw the colonel's heartbeat had stabilized. “He asked, ‘What did you do?' I had done nothing to the veteran – he just needed a human touch.”
That touch also affected her and Reynolds in their military service. “I helped one soldier walk again at Fort Hood,” says Reynolds, now a physical therapist and Iowa National Guard member. “Most gratifying is helping a soldier come back from deployment and go home.”
Pam Craven Reynolds, M.S.'91, says deploying physical therapists with soldiers is like a “football team taking its trainer. They can do a lot in field.”
The U.S. military agrees. For example, physical therapy teams are now permanent and internal to each brigade combat team in the Army. According to the 82 nd Airborne Division's public affairs office, this practice brings needed care and relief to soldiers, keeping the battalions' manpower and combat strength higher. Their treatment helps soldiers function in spite of their uncomfortable gear and, when they are injured, enables them to get them back in action quicker. PT teams often treat local residents, too.
Major Brian Young, M.S.'96, D.Sc., a physical therapist at Sheppard Air Force Base in northern Texas, adds that a physician referral is not required for evaluation and management by physical therapists, reducing “the amount of time needed for a service member to access PT from the time they receive an injury.”
“Additionally, we are credentialed to order imaging services and basic non-steroidal, anti-inflammatory and muscle relaxant medications,” he notes. That's a plus in his role as a medical services flight commander, in which he oversees the operations of Sheppard's family practice, internal medicine, trainee health and pediatric clinics.
Military medicine and physical therapy complement each other, Young says. He enjoys the autonomy to practice, which is consistent with the American Physical Therapy Association's vision and values, and the “constant challenges” presented by his patients.
“I find the satisfaction of working with service members and helping them get back to work, as well as the opportunity to mentor others – both PTs and those service members under my command – the most rewarding parts of my job,” he says.
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