Military Healthcare

We can now add the Military Health System (MHS) to a list that includes Arkansas Children’s Hospital, Humana, and Siemens Medical as those healthcare organizations that have incorporated some form of the Disney Institute’s customer service into their operations.

Since Disney Institute opened in 1986, millions of attendees representing virtually every sector of business from every corner of the globe have had an opportunity to witness and experience these innovative business strategies. Disney Institute remains the only professional development company where you will literally step into a “living laboratory” at Disney Theme Parks and Resorts for guided behind-the-scenes field experiences. Disney’s brand of business excellence is also being taught at locations across the U.S. and, to date, in more than 45 countries around the world.

Still stinging from a 2007 scandal that rocked Walter Reed Army Medical Center to its foundation, the Army turned to a seemingly unlikely partner to instill throughout the institution a mindset of putting patients first.

Then-Col. Patricia D. Horoho, now a major general leading the Army Nurse Corps, recognized that the same principles that had made the Disney Corporation so successful could apply to the Walter Reed Health Care System she had stepped in to command, so she turned to the Disney Institute insights into how to transform the Army’s health-care culture.

Mandatory sessions for every Walter Reed employee, led by Disney trainers, emphasized every person’s role in providing patients and their families the best possible hospital experience.

The initiative proved so successful that when the Disney contract expired, Army Medical Command hired a former Disney employee for an additional five-year stint to build on the groundwork.

The goal, explained Frederick Larson, who now serves in Walter Reed’s care, service and cultural transformation office, is to extend those lessons — throughout the joint task force overseeing all military health care in the Washington national capital region, and ultimately, to the entire Army medicine community.

As you can image, this is quite an undertaking. Equipped with 59 hospitals, 364 health clinics and a $50 billion budget, the MHS delivers health care to a beneficiary population of 9.6 million service members, veterans, and family members.

This DoD enterprise consists of the Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs; the medical departments of the Army, Navy, Marine Corps, Air Force, Coast Guard, and Joint Chiefs of Staff; the Combatant Command surgeons; and TRICARE providers (including private sector healthcare providers, hospitals and pharmacies).

Knowledge Source recently published its Military Healthcare Market Overview to help clients gain an understanding of this complex organization. Included in the new report are overviews of the MHS, TRICARE, and Veterans Affairs.