Airmen help Afghans stand up flight medicine clinic

Published Oct. 25, 2007
By Staff Sgt. Trevor Tiernan
U.S. Central Command Air Forces Combat Correspondent Team

KABUL, Afghanistan -- Like many Airmen around the world, Maj. Mical Kupke's day starts with a brief meeting to plan out the day's events. But that's where the similarity ends.

The flight surgeon and her team's day involves mentoring members of the Afghan national army air corps in the field of flight medicine and assisting them with standing up a flight medicine clinic.

The major, along with Capt. Marilyn Thomas, a flight nurse; Master Sgt. Brian Engle, a public health technician; and Tech. Sgt. Janet Wilson, an aeromedical technician; make up part of the air corps advisers group at Kabul International Airport in Afghanistan.

The mentoring process begins with assessing each of the Afghan airmen's individual ability and skill level, Major Kupke said.

"It starts out one-on-one," Major Kupke said. "We talk one-on-one with an interpreter just to figure out what someone's knowledge base is and what they know."

From there the mentors determine what training or mentoring the airmen require and what skill they need to improve. The mentors either provide in-depth training -- according to the task at hand -- or take a more hands-off approach, merely providing guidance and suggestions as the Afghan airmen go to work.

"It's a very dynamic process," Captain Thomas said. "We come out here daily and interact with them. Depending on the plan for the day, we'll either do training, or we'll mentor and just give them advice and suggestions about how to better manage their clinic."

The Air Force team trains on how to safely load patients onto aircraft, how to set up the laboratory, combat life saver skills, basic life support, and what Major Kupke identified as a key priority for the Afghanistan's air corps -- casualty and medical evacuation.

"We have the No. 2 (ministry of defense) priority for the air corps which is casualty and medical evacuation," she said. "So we really had to figure out where their capabilities were with that, and what we can do to help facilitate that from a training perspective."

In order to provide the best training possible, short of responding to a real evacuation, the Airmen are using all the resources available locally including loading patients onto MI-17 helicopters, coordinating with the Czech Republic field hospital here and working with the medevac unit located at nearby Bagram Air Base.

Major Kupke said the clinic's goals are for it to be a stand-alone clinic and have a medical and casualty evacuation capability.

"We also have to be able to perform flying class physicals that meet Afghan and U.S. standards," she said. "We are sending pilots to the United States for training on the MI-17, and hopefully some fixed-wing (aircraft) as well, so they have to meet U.S. standards. Right now the clinic isn't equipped to give them the proper physicals so we have to use U.S. facilities."

A U.S. trained flight surgeon is required to sign off on the flight physicals. Currently that person is Major Kupke, but she hopes to get a U.S trained Afghan flight surgeon who will, in turn, train their fellow airmen.

"(Our goal) is to train them to do this themselves so basically our job is done," said Sergeant Engle. "The ultimate goal for Afghanistan is for us to be able to step away as the ANA becomes self-sustaining."

Sergeant Engle and the rest of the team members are already seeing progress as the Afghan airmen begin to work more independently.

"I'm starting to step away from some of the stuff that they're doing," he said. "They are very smart people and they've been doing this for 30 years, since the Russian times, so we're just giving them our perspective. It's really rewarding to see them press on with their own thing and not need us over their shoulder 24/7."

Major Kupke said she has also seen results, especially from the recent opportunity to send some the of the clinic leadership to the United States.

"They got to the see big picture of what an aero-medical program is," she said. "For them to be able to come back and prioritize their own needs, and to tell me 'I see what you're talking about' is a winner."

It's a winner for the Afghan national army air corps, and also a winner for the deployed Airmen.

"The fact that we're able to bring something to the air corps and help the Afghan National Army build up their structure is very positive," Sergeant Wilson said. "It makes me proud that I can contribute just a tiny portion to that."

"I think this is one of those things I'll tell my grandchildren about," Major Kupke said. "I've not had an experience like this, directly mentoring or interacting with host nation members. It's very positive to see how they respond, not just to me, but to us as a team.

"They're my Afghan family now and I hope that I'll get the opportunity to see them again," she said.