American Hospital Association Honors Two Federal Health Care Leaders with 2017 Awards

WASHINGTON (July 26, 2018) – The American Hospital Association (AHA) presented two federal hospital leaders with awards recognizing their outstanding service to the health care field. These awards recognize uniformed and non-uniformed federal health care leaders who have distinguished themselves through singularly significant or innovative achievements, and leadership that have contributed substantially to the mission of the federal health system. The presentation took place at the AHA Leadership Summit in San Diego.

“The women and men with our federal health system are an invaluable resource to our nation,” said AHA President and CEO Rick Pollack. “They provide critical care to so many, including those currently on the front lines of combat, those who honorably served our country, their families, and our Native American population. The knowledge, experience and expertise that these caregivers share with their civilian colleagues continues to improve our nation’s health care system. We are pleased to honor Capt. James Hancock and Lt. Col. Johnathan Compton.”

2017 Award for Excellence – Capt. James Hancock, M.D., Commanding Officer, Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune, North Carolina

Capt. Hancock’s leadership and innovation has solidified trauma care for the eastern North Carolina area and shaped the future of military trauma care, readiness, and training for the next generation. While providing health care for more than 55,000 active duty military and their dependents, and managing a staff of more than 2,000, Capt. Hancock worked to develop groundbreaking partnerships with community leaders and civilian trauma centers. He managed to secure agreements for trauma transport and care protocols, and created a robust clinical training environment for physicians and corpsmen. This resulted in enhanced preparation in the core trauma skills critical to wartime missions. He also advocated for policy support for expanding the boundaries of military care and gained special designee status to provide care for civilian trauma patients.

Since expanding the boundaries of military care, Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune have cared for almost 150 trauma patients. Capt. Hancock’s pursuit of Medical Center designation and Level III trauma capabilities at Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune serves both the community gap for trauma services in eastern North Carolina and creates the Navy’s first trauma center in support of operational readiness. His efforts to provide these services resulted in Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune receiving a stellar report from the American College of Surgeons.   

2017 Special Achievement Award – Lt. Col. Johnathan Compton, M.D.,  Deputy Director of Medical Services at the Air Force Medical Operations Agency in San Antonio, Texas

Prior to joining the Air Force Medical Operations Agency in San Antonio, Lt. Col. Compton served as commander of the 377^th Medical Operations Squadron at Kirtland Air Force Base, N.M. While there, he implemented multiple innovative solutions to the challenge of providing primary care for a mobile workforce—taking “the clinic” to warfighters, and delivering health care when, where and how it was most needed. He piloted a mental health clinic that embedded mental health professionals in primary care clinics dedicated to critical military personnel who work with sensitive materials and data. This allowed service members to have ready access to mental health services without the fear of stigma. The result was a 60 percent increase in use of these services, while decreasing delays in care by 90 percent. His team also launched mobile vaccinations and lab procedures to improve readiness rates to 99 percent. In addition, his efforts to deliver physical therapy and chiropractic care directly where and when needed resulted in Air Force Global Strike Command-level recognition. Beyond his demonstrated leadership, Lt. Col. Compton is an inspirational and innovative commander and clinician. This was shown further during a 50 percent clinical staff shortage that lasted four months in which Lt. Col. Compton led partnerships with local network facilities to ensure patients continued to receive prompt and appropriate care.

Capt. Hancock and Lt. Col. Compton are outstanding, innovative, and inspirational federal health care leaders. We proudly honor them for their service.

Contact:         

Arika Trim, (202) 626-2319 atrim@aha.org

Marie Johnson, (202) 626-2351 mjohnson@aha.org

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About the American Hospital Association

The AHA is a not-for-profit association of health care provider organizations and individuals that are committed to the improvement of health in their communities. The AHA is the national advocate for its members, which include nearly 5,000 hospitals, health care systems, networks and other providers of care. Founded in 1898, the AHA provides education for health care leaders and is a source of information on health care issues and trends. For more information, visit www.aha.org.