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AF medical branch celebrates 60 years

San Antonio airmen celebrated 60 years of the Air Force Medical Services June 25 with the service’s top doc.

Lt. Gen. James Roudebush, the Air Force’s Surgeon General, traveled to Texas to highlight the Air Force’s medical branch.

“We have evolved. We have moved forward. We are a learning organization in our current parlors, but the fact is that we have never taken a step backward and we are eager and able to take every step forward,” Roudebush said in a speech reported by Air Force News Service.

During conflicts in Iraq and Afghanistan, the medical service has transported more than 62,000 troops for medical care, including Army Sgt. Daniel Powers, who was stabbed in the head in 2007 by an Iraqi with a nine-inch knife.

Two days before the San Antonio celebration, Powers participated in his first parachute jump since his injury. He plans to deploy to Afghanistan in July.

In addition to battlefield evacuations, the Air Force transported more than 2,600 patients in the aftermath of 2005 Hurricanes Rita and Katrina.

“I think the most important thing in celebrating the 60th anniversary is the chance to look back and see how far medicine has evolved over the years and to see how strongly we will remain committed to the Air Force mission,” retired Lt. Gen. George Peach Taylor Jr, a former Air Force surgeon general who retired in 2006, said in the June 26 Air Force News Service article.