Joint medical maintenance team saves lives

  • Published
  • By Luke Waack
  • JBER PAO
JOINT BASE ELMENDORF-RICHARDSON, Alaska --  Housed in the basement of the Joint Base Elmendorf-Richardson DoD/VA Joint Venture Hospital, the Medical Equipment Repair Center services a $36 million inventory of lifesaving medical equipment.

Air Force Master Sgt. Margaret Cooper heads a team of 11 highly trained biomedical equipment technicians who serve more than 115,000 people and create the hub for medical equipment repair and maintenance for Alaska's military medical treatment facilities and clinics.

According to Sergeant Cooper, maintaining medical equipment that literally give life-saving support to patients is important to her and her team.

"I have always been trained and take it personally and think of this piece of medical equipment being attached to one of my family members," she said. "That always comes to my mind when I'm checking out a piece of equipment -- it keeps my integrity in check."

BMETs face many challenges in their day-to-day mission, whether on base or deployed in a combat zone.

"Some of the equipment we service we do have concerns about infection control issues, we have to consider hazardous material that may be inside the equipment or used with the equipment -- radiation with the X-ray," she said.

Despite the hard work required, Cooper's team performs well, proven last year when they were named the 673d Medical Group "Flight of the Year" along with their Medical Logistics counterparts.

There is no shortage of work, or types of equipment, for the sergeant and her team in Alaska.

"We inspect any and all kinds of medical equipment before it goes out to the facility (Joint Hospital) or out to other facilities on the base and used for patient care," Sergeant Cooper said.

"In this hospital, we take care of everything from blood pressure pumps up to the MRI systems. It's a whole gamut of equipment," said Tech. Sgt. Raymond Hillis, noncommissioned officer in charge of Medical Equipment.

And all the equipment needs to be calibrated, at least annually, if not more often. It's very important that accuracy is maintained, especially when administering medications and life-saving fluids, which makes calibration trips to outlying Coast Guard, Air Force and Army medical clinics a requirement.

"Our shop is a medical equipment repair center which means we have more specialized test equipment and training for the BMETs we have here than the smaller units so we can go out on the road and maintain those smaller units on an annual basis," Sergeant Hillis said.

The DoD technical school training for a BMET is 11 months long and is currently held at the Joint Services Medical Education and Training Center, at Fort Sam Houston, Texas.

"We have to be trained mechanically, electronically, power production type electrical, we have to know hydraulics, pneumatics, laser systems, imaging systems in X-ray, so it's a wide scope," Sergeant Hillis said. "We have people that specify, get really good in certain areas, so they'll be our leads in those areas. Then we'll have people that are good in general in all the different sections."

The MERC also supports Army Troop Medical Clinics.

"If I need help with medical diagnostic test equipment, they're more than willing to help out," said Army Sgt. Charles Minnig, Medical Department Activity-Alaska maintenance technician. "Right now, I'm returning a thermometer tester that I used to test my equipment."

In some ways, BMETs are just like auto mechanics or aircraft maintainers, Sergeant Hillis said, they just work with different equipment.

"Personally, I love turning wrenches on things,"  he added. "I love playing with new technology, and with medical equipment you have the latest greatest technology."

"Everything in the medical scene is the cutting edge. Some of our oldest technology we see might be five to seven years old," he continued. "You compare that to maintainers of aircraft on the base -- that's 50s, 60s, 70s technology they are working on -- we're working on the cutting edge of everything."

Next year, the technicians will see an additional $3.1 million of equipment at the hospital.

The medical equipment technicians also deploy to perform their duties downrange. On average, they spend six months deployed and 18 months back in their home station.

In a deployed hospital compound, biomedical equipment technicians maintain tents, generators for medical facilities, heating ventilation and cooling, oxygen production systems -- they even make furniture and laying concrete at times, if it's necessary.

Whether at home station or deployed, BMETs perform life-saving work, quietly, behind the scenes.