DVIDS – Information – Military medical upkeep chief retires, acknowledged for 42-year profession

FORT DETRICK, Md. — Jack Rosarius has devoted his total 42-year profession with the U.S. Military to the medical upkeep enterprise.

However he virtually didn’t.

“I truly enlisted as airborne infantry,” Rosarius recalled. “However a pal of mine who was within the Military, he mentioned airborne infantry isn’t for you.”

Rosarius is glad he took his pal’s recommendation and so are his colleagues and coworkers, who described him as a pacesetter, mentor and teammate — to not point out one of many Military’s premiere material consultants within the scientific engineering area.

“Jack Rosarius exemplifies the most effective of the Military Civilian Corps, with a profession spanning a number of conflicts and wars,” mentioned Col. Lynn Marm, a former U.S. Military Medical Materiel Company commander who has identified Rosarius for near twenty years.

“His repute is difficult gained and the results of distinguished service to Military Drugs, each on lively responsibility and as a civil servant,” she mentioned.

Rosarius, 60, admits he “didn’t have a clue about medical upkeep” when he enlisted in 1978 on the age of 17, however he shortly embraced the career and have become an professional within the area, dedicating himself to the well-being of warfighters.

On Dec. 18, colleagues and buddies collectively acknowledged Rosarius throughout a retirement ceremony at Fort Detrick. His 42 years of steady Military service started with 21 years in lively responsibility that included deployments in help of Operations Desert Defend and Desert Storm.

“At this time isn’t about me,” Rosarius mentioned. “It’s about me saying thanks to you all.”

All through his profession, Rosarius, who has served as director of USAMMA’s Medical Upkeep Administration Directorate, or M3D, for almost all of his civilian years, has made a optimistic influence on many Troopers and coworkers who’ve served alongside him.

“His method to all the things he does is for the betterment of humanity, the nation and the group and other people round him,” mentioned Kevin Culihan, deputy director of M3D. “The one phrase that defines him finest is responsibility.

“He constantly distinguishes himself via extraordinary public service,” Culihan mentioned. “It’s his responsibility to repeatedly lead by instance, doing the fitting factor and caring for individuals at all times.”

Army to civilian

Rosarius was born in Heidelberg, Germany, the place his father labored after serving three years within the Military.

As an adolescent, Rosarius shortly received again to his roots when he began his personal Military profession. His first responsibility station after finishing primary fight coaching was on the similar hospital in Heidelberg the place his dad and mom welcomed him to the world.

Later, he served on the U.S. Military Medical Materiel Heart-Europe, additionally situated in Germany, in two totally different roles in MEDSOM, brief for Medical Provide Optical and Upkeep, items over a four-year interval.

From there, he returned to america, serving at Tobyhanna Military Depot in Pennsylvania after which for USAMMA at Fort Detrick earlier than his deployment through the Gulf Struggle within the early 1990s.

USAMMA and USAMMC-E are each direct reporting items to Military Medical Logistics Command.

His closing cease earlier than his return to Fort Detrick as a civilian was at Moncrief Military Neighborhood Hospital in Fort Jackson, South Carolina. He retired on the rank of Chief Warrant Officer three in 1999.

Transferring again to Fort Detrick, Rosarius made his house in Frederick, Maryland, together with his spouse, Daybreak, who presently serves as principal assistant for acquisition at U.S. Military Medical Analysis and Improvement Command.

“The reality is, I had no intent of working for the federal government once more, however my spouse was right here,” he mentioned. “We truly had a suggestion from an organization that wished to rent us each,” however she had simply entered civil service and wasn’t prepared to go away.

Good factor for USAMMA, the place Rosarius has labored for his total civilian profession spanning one other 21 years, basically in the identical place. As director of medical upkeep, his expertise contains all the things from sustaining gear to performing expertise assessments to growing coverage and doctrine in any respect echelons, from unit to depot ranges.

“On reflection, it’s nice having a noble trigger; one thing extra than simply making a living,” Rosarius mentioned. “It provides you satisfaction. I’m glad life unrolled the way in which it has.”

Throughout his civilian profession at USAMMA, many Troopers have come and gone, however few go away with out tales of Rosarius’ influence in a method or one other.

Col. Bradley Ladd, deputy chief of workers for operations at AMLC, mentioned Rosarius has been a mentor to him over the previous 5 years working collectively.

“He is likely one of the keys to my success within the navy,” Ladd mentioned. “Mr. Rosarius has formed the medical upkeep panorama over his profession to ensure the readiness of our power to combat and win our nation’s conflicts.

“He’s a selfless chief who cares deeply about individuals,” Ladd added, “and he’ll do something with the intention to assist his workers, friends and supervisors, each professionally and personally.”

‘My calling’

Above all the things else, Rosarius mentioned that “being a Soldier was my calling.”

“There’s little doubt about it,” he mentioned. “I beloved being a Soldier. And in contrast to lots of people, after I look again, virtually all of my favourite reminiscences are being within the area, being deployed. I actually loved that setting.”

Rosarius mentioned he at all times loved the deployment setting due to the women and men to his left and proper, all targeted on the identical mission.

“And if you obtain the mission, there’s a wierd satisfaction,” he mentioned. “There’s nowhere else you get that, and that dedication from the individuals apart from from that setting.”

Along with his active-duty deployment through the Gulf Struggle, Rosarius additionally had the chance to deploy as a civilian via his work at USAMMA, becoming a member of forward-deployed items to enhance and prepare medical maintainers on the bottom.

“I felt like a Soldier once more after I was over there … handing off hospitals, sustaining hospitals,” he mentioned. “It was virtually like being again within the Military.”

Marm mentioned Rosarius “isn’t outlined solely by technical experience,” including that he’s the kind of chief who “strikes to the sound of the weapons” and units an instance for others.

“Jack is an innovator, main the scientific engineering area via a number of evolutions pushed by the rising sophistication of medical gear, scientific observe and the arrival of telehealth,” she mentioned. “He has ensured that Military navy and civilian scientific engineers maintain tempo with the consistently evolving cyber and technical points of deployable medical methods.”

Rosarius’ biggest contribution to the navy? “Numerous lives saved on the battlefield,” Marm mentioned.

Highest expert technicians

Medical logisticians and upkeep technicians are often called drawback solvers. Rosarius definitely earned that title throughout his profession.

Culihan mentioned Rosarius acknowledged the shortcomings up to now upkeep help construction for deployable medical formations, resulting in efforts to create the Military Medical Division’s Upkeep Sustainment Program.

“He coordinated for assets and funding and applied a help construction to boost medical upkeep throughout the operational power,” Culihan mentioned.

A serious enchancment credited to Rosarius was the institution of USAMMA’s Ahead Restore Exercise-Medical, or FRA-M, crew.

Rosarius mentioned the FRA-M was constructed “out of necessity” in 2007 after ongoing struggles for field-level maintainers to maintain CT machines in good working order.

“No one may maintain them up,” he mentioned of the CT machines. “And I knew we had the best expert technicians anyplace within the DOD.

“So the idea was — why don’t we take our technicians, make them the very best, allow them to concentrate on a commodity and we are able to rotate them into the theater to take care of gear that is likely to be too complicated for unit-level maintainers.”

Three totally different divisions have been arrange at every of USAMMA’s medical upkeep depots — one targeted on laboratory gear, one other on anesthesia and pulmonary gadgets, and the third for imaging gear.

The FRA-M initiative boosted availability charges for CT machines, amongst different gadgets, from 55% to over 90%, Culihan mentioned, crediting Rosarius for driving the hassle.

Deployed groups work via totally different forward-operating bases, sustaining and calibrating gear, but in addition coaching unit-level maintainers.

“So after they go away, they go away with not solely working gear, however a way more competent technician on the bottom,” Rosarius mentioned. “To me, they’re type of the guts and soul of what we’ve constructed.”

Chief Warrant Officer 5 Wendell Johnson, 670A guide to the Military Surgeon Normal, referred to as Rosarius a “visionary” for his work with the FRA-M groups.

“[Soldiers] solely kick down doorways as a result of they’re assured that these gadgets are going to be there to maintain them alive,” mentioned Johnson, who was the visitor speaker at Rosarius’ retirement ceremony.

Marm added that Rosarius’ imaginative and prescient is now “exhausting wired” into doctrine, with groups supporting not simply Southwest Asia as initially supposed, but in addition throughout Europe and the Pacific.

“Since then, Jack’s unwavering concentrate on readiness has resulted in an unprecedented coaching and equipping posture of the Military’s medical warfare reserve program,” she mentioned.

‘Silent heroes’

Whereas it’s normally not one of many first issues individuals consider, medical upkeep is a vital a part of the general mission of the U.S. navy.

Rosarius mentioned it’s simply as essential as a clinician rendering care.

“When you’ve a affected person that goes into the OR, they’re giving their entire life to that clinician,” he mentioned. “However what they don’t know is, they’re additionally giving it these technicians. Virtually each gadget, whether or not it’s life-sustaining, diagnostic, therapeutic, no matter — our of us have been the final to the touch.

“The reality of the matter is, they’re half and parcel to creating positive these sufferers come again out alive,” Rosarius added. “I like to think about these of us as silent heroes. They’re completely a part of that medical continuum.”

Because the U.S. confronted enemies within the Center East that tailored their strategies for injuring and killing service members, Marm mentioned Rosarius’ affect and advocacy was a catalyst for continued funding in medical depots and equipping applications, in addition to the design of units, kits and outfits and coaching that “retains the promise of life-saving care to America’s little kids into the long run.”

She pointed to the case of Sgt. Brendan Marrocco, the primary U.S. Soldier serving in Iraq or Afghanistan to outlive a quadruple amputation and first particular person to obtain a bilateral arm transplant at Johns Hopkins Hospital.

“There are various tales like this one, all attainable due to medical logistics working as a part of a battlefield system of care not replicated in another Military on the planet,” Marm mentioned. “The very important provide of treatment, provides and gear enabled life-saving level of harm care and evacuation to battlefield surgical procedure.”