Maryland Defense Force Deploys Medical Team to Lakota Sioux Reservation
BALTIMORE (July 5, 2007) - A team of medical professionals from the Maryland Defense Force (MDDF) will deploy with the Maryland Air National Guard’s 175th Medical Group on a medical support mission to the Indian Health Service hospital on the Rosebud Lakota Sioux Reservation in South Dakota. The deployment will last from 9 – 23 July, 2007.
The MDDF team, comprised of six physicians and a psychiatric clinical specialist from the MDDF’s 10th Medical Regiment, will augment the Air National Guard which has a number of physicians deployed overseas or in training elsewhere.
“This is our role,” said MDDF Colonel Bob Barish, commander of the 10th Medical Regiment, “to provide competent technical and professional support to the National Guard.”
While at the reservation, the 55 members of the combined MDANG-MDDF medical mission will assist existing Indian Health Service staff by providing services in the following clinics: Optometry, Dental, Diabetes, Geriatric, Mental Health, Tuberculosis, and Immunization. They will also work in the Medical, Surgical, and Pediatric services, as well as in the Operating Room and Emergency Dept. Problems common at Rosebud include alcoholism, drug abuse, diabetes, kidney disease, obesity, hypertension, trauma, suicide, and domestic violence.
“This deployment provides our medical personnel the opportunity to exercise their professional skills in a challenging remote environment, similar to what one might find during a civil emergency, while at the same time building closer ties and exercising interoperability with our colleagues in the National Guard,” Barish added.
This is the third out-of-state deployment completed by the Maryland Defense Force. In September 2005 more than 200 MDDF medical personnel, along with command and support staff, deployed to Jefferson Parish, La., in relief efforts following Hurricane Katrina, providing medical treatment for more than 7,000 citizens. MDDF medical personnel also joined the 175th Medical Group on its humanitarian medical mission to Bosnia-Herzegovina in July 2006, marking the first deployment of the MDDF outside the United States. In that mission, the joint MDANG-MDDF team treated more than 2000 people in 17 remote villages across the country.
The Maryland Defense Force, headquartered at the Pikesville Military Reservation in Baltimore, is a volunteer uniformed state military agency organized under the Maryland Military Department. Formally established by the Maryland legislature in 1917, the unit's heritage and traditions trace back to the 17th century. Its mission is to provide competent supplemental professional and technical support to the Maryland Military Department and the Maryland National Guard.
MDDF’s 10th Medical Regiment provides professional medical and mental health support to the Maryland National Guard and strengthens Maryland communities by augmenting the state's physical and mental health infrastructure. During natural or man-made disasters the regiment provides emergency surge capacity support to civil authorities as directed by the Governor through the Adjutant General.
For further information about the Maryland Defense Force, visit www.mddefenseforce.org.
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