Joining forces initiative: steps toward improved care for military personnel.

Murphy • Special Report T Joining Forces initiative, which is jointly sponsored by the White House, the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), and the Department of Defense (DoD), is described as “a national initiative that mobilizes all sectors of society to give service members and their families the support they earned.”1 One important component of the initiative is ensuring that medical students, physicians, and other health care providers understand that an individual’s physical and mental condition may be linked to his or her military experience.2 The American Osteopathic Association (AOA) was asked to become a partner in the Joining Forces Task Force. The members of this task force read like the Who’s Who of US health care—the American Osteopathic Association, Association of American Colleges of Osteopathic Medicine, American Medical Association, and Association of American Medical Colleges, just to name a few of the more than 30 groups represented. The initial meetings were held January 9 through January 11, 2012, in Washington, DC, at the DoD’s National Intrepid Center of Excellence for Psychological Health and Traumatic Brain Injury at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, and a day of briefings by the Vice Chairmen of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, ADM James A. Winnefeld, Jr; the Surgeon General of the US Navy, VADM Matthew L. Nathan; and the Commanding Officer of the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, RADM Alton L. Stocks. The meeting concluded with a 4-hour roundtable discussion at the White House, where the members of the task force were addressed by First Lady Michelle Obama and representatives from the DoD and the VA. SPECIAL REPORT