Joining Forces Program at the Medical College of Wisconsin

The AMCT3 program is based upon directives within the 2017 National Defense Authorization Act and is designed to sustain the trauma surgery and resuscitation skills for the licensed providers within an US Army Forward Resuscitative Surgical Team (FRST). These clinicians are fully imbedded and licensed to treat patients while stationed in Milwaukee. Periodically the AMCT3 personnel provide care as a team in the trauma bay (approximately 1-2 times per month), in order to build and sustain the interoperability necessary during deployment. Additional individual specialists and surgeons may be added to this program from year to year, each to remain for their full 3-year term.

This program is designed for Physicians and Physician Assistants assigned to Special Operations units as the groups or battalions’ providers. Milwaukee is the first military-civilian partnership that focuses on the fundamental principles of critical care with limited resources. Throughout a 4-week rotation, these licensed military providers will partner with the institutions credentialed providers to sharpen their knowledge and skillset in different areas of patient care. They are in the capacity of a learner doing an unaccredited mini-fellowship, with varying degrees of independence, based upon their individual competencies and the supervising providers’ discretion.

This innovative program is designed to build upon the skills taught to the US Army Special Operations Combat Medic (SOCM) and Special Forces Medical Sergeant (SFMS). Over a 4-week course, military personnel will rotate through the hospital to augment their abilities as non-licensed providers. Training objectives encompass a wide spectrum of acute and sub-acute care. Rotations through the ED and Trauma Center, Surgery, SICU, and specialty clinics where they will work directly with patients under the supervision of licensed providers and nursing staff, with varying degrees of independence, based upon the individual’s competency and the supervising providers’ discretion.