Peace through strength — one of the Defense Department's basic tenets — is partially achieved through readiness. A ready, focused force isn't possible without the crucial medical care offered to warfighters to ensure they're equipped for any fight that might come.
Navy hospital corpsmen are critical components of military medicine, including as support for surgeons in various specialties. Corpsmen with the surgical tech specialty are considered the backbone of the departments in which they work, helping the Navy as it provides day-to-day medical support to sailors who often operate in far-flung locations.
According to a draft of the Medical Transparency Database from the Defense Health Agency, as of September 2024, there were about 830 hospital corpsmen with the surgical tech specialty in the Navy. In the Army and Air Force, nearly 1,400 more soldiers and airmen work as surgical technicians.
From assisting during surgeries to properly carrying out disinfection and sterilization processes, surgical techs are vital in fields ranging from dentistry and ear, nose and throat services to labor and delivery and ophthalmology. They go where they're needed, whether it's on a trauma team near a combat zone, on a humanitarian mission or at a military medical treatment facility.
"Some of the surgical techs here can be [asked] to serve in Djibouti or tasked out to certain hospitals that are critically undermanned. There's a wide range of opportunities," said Navy Petty Officer 2nd Class Quinn Mosley, the lead hospital corpsman and certified surgical technician at Naval Hospital Bremerton's Ophthalmology Clinic and Refractive Surgery Center, Bremerton, Washington.
In 2023, Bremerton's ophthalmology clinic handled more than 4,400 appointments for active-duty service members and other uniformed personnel. The refractive surgery center, which does corrective surgeries such as LASIK, brings in patients from across the Indo-Pacific, a region where the DOD is working to strengthen alliances against ever-increasing threats from China.
"We are the fastest turnaround for refractive surgeries," Mosley said. "You will be seen 10 times faster [here than] anywhere else in the Navy."
Improving Operational Readiness
Bremerton's ophthalmology clinic emphasizes enhancing warfighters' visual performance which means they strive to improve operational readiness by reducing the need for glasses and contact lenses. Service members can have nearsightedness, farsightedness and astigmatism corrected through PRK or LASIK surgery.
Mosley's duties include ordering specialty implants for surgeries, managing supplies and equipment, and overseeing other ophthalmology surgical techs and hospital corpsmen. Any surgery is nerve-wracking, but especially those involving the eyes, so the surgical techs also help educate their patients on the procedures and what could potentially happen, as well as offer reassurances to calm them.
"I make sure I play a little bit of music for them in my office just to get them 'zen'd' out," Mosley said.
Mosley's job also includes traveling with patients if they need to be transferred. For example, she might go with a patient to Madigan Army Medical Center on Joint Base Lewis-McChord, Washington, about 45 minutes south, so the doctors performing the surgery have someone familiar with them.
Mosley said getting surgeries set up in a timely fashion in ophthalmology can be challenging, so when patients get the relief they've been seeking, it's incredibly satisfying.
"That is the best part of my job — in real-time seeing how you've drastically changed someone's life," Mosley said. "I've had patients come back, and they're just so thankful. They thank the entire staff, and they explain how their quality of life has drastically improved."