Photo By Petty Officer 2nd Class Dakotah Hendricks | PORTSMOUTH, Va. (July 26, 2019) – Master Chief Hospital Corpsman Ronald Lucky...... read more read more
Capt. Lisa Mulligan became Naval Medical Center Portsmouth’s (NMCP) 78th commanding officer during a change of command ceremony on July 26. Mulligan relieved Capt. Christopher Culp, who had commanded the medical center since July 2016.
“To the crew of Naval Medical Center Portsmouth; the military, civilians, contractors and volunteers who make up the team, I am genuinely excited to be here with you during this transformational time,” Mulligan said. “Thank you for what you do every day. Not only do you provide top-notch care, but you train the future of Navy Medicine.”
Mulligan had previously served as executive officer at Naval Medical Center San Diego, and Naval Hospital Camp Pendleton’s commanding officer prior to most recently serving as the Chief Medical Officer at the Bureau of Medicine and Surgery.
Vice Adm. Forrest C. Faison, Navy surgeon general, and chief, Bureau of Medicine and Surgery, was the presiding officer for the ceremony.
“I am looking at a team that makes me incredibly proud,” Faison said. “Every day, trust is placed in our hands because we are privileged to care for less than one percent of our nation who volunteer to sacrifice and serve to protect us and ensure that we can pass on to our children the greatest gift we will ever have, freedom.”
Faison went on to highlight some of the medical center’s accomplishments under Culp’s leadership.
“You ensured that we are ready and able to support the fleet today and the fleet tomorrow by these amazing training programs that you do to train tomorrow's caretakers and providers to continue to honor that trust,” Faison said. “The command increased mental health appointment availability by over 22 percent each month to meet the growing mental health demands of our service members and their families, ensuring the OPTEMPO of our Navy and sister services will remain high. Supporting underserved areas, you opened and relocated Branch Health Clinics close to where people live, enabling an additional 22,000 patients to get their care from us more conveniently.”
Prior to reading his orders and officially relinquishing command, Culp spoke to NMCP staff about his time in command. He thanked his Command Executive Board (CEB) members, directors, executive officers, command master chiefs, and staff.
“If you look around you, you see masters of our game, you see heroes to our patients,” Culp said. “Because of this, we deployed a quarter of our staff on three occasions, twice with minimal notice. No civilian facility in America can put a quarter of their clinical staff out the door with no impact to quality or safety and minimal impact to access and convenience, but we did and it is in progress as we speak. You may be interested to know that through the mid part of 2018, I tallied every email and call I got that reference any care provided, you might be surprised that the compliment to complaint ratio is 17 to one. What struck me was how many of those compliments were not about you or me, they were about corpsmen who they had at the bedside at the time of pain, discomfort, and anxiety; who provided comfort, care and compassion. I think that speaks volumes of why we are ‘First and Finest,’ and I want to relay that back to you. Thank you all for the exceptional level of care. It has been a privilege of a lifetime serving as your commanding officer, to stand with you, amazed by your dedication, your passion, your successes. To stand with you through your trials and tragedies, to trumpet your successes and mostly to care so very much about a place and its heritage and its people. That is the treasure of commanding and I will treasure it, and I will miss it. Thank you all so much.”
As the U.S. Navy's oldest, continuously-operating military hospital since 1830, Naval Medical Center Portsmouth proudly serves past and present military members and their families. The nationally-acclaimed, state-of-the-art medical center, along with the area's 10 branch health and
TRICARE Prime Clinics, provide care for the Hampton Roads area. The medical center also supports premier research and teaching programs designed to prepare new doctors, nurses and hospital corpsman for future roles in healing and wellness.
| Date Taken: | 07.26.2019 |
| Date Posted: | 07.30.2019 11:36 |
| Story ID: | 333625 |
| Location: | PORTSMOUTH, VA, US |
| Web Views: | 513 |
| Downloads: | 0 |
This work, NMCP Holds Change of Command Ceremony, by PO1 Laura Myers, identified by DVIDS, must comply with the restrictions shown on https://www.dvidshub.net/about/copyright.
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