Page 143 - Journal of Special Operations Medicine - Spring 2015

“We had the benefit of walking in those shoes,

so let’s make it better for these guys.”

—The 17th Surgeon General of the United States, Dr Richard Carmona,
on a Life of National Service, Including Being a Special Forces Medic

Interviewed by John F. Kragh Jr

How did you come to there and there’s a lady with her and she’s having this
SOF medicine? baby. So Team Sergeant says, ‘Carmona, go over there
I dropped out of high school and check her out.’ So I go over and I look; there’s a baby;
at 17, I had nothing to do; I she’s crowning. I remember reaching down, pulling the
had been homeless as a kid baby, the baby crowned, stuff coming out, and I’m look-
on and off. I enlisted and ing at the cord, and the placenta’s still inside. And I can
wanted to join the Special remember to this day that I thought, ‘Shit, what did they
Forces, so I got my GED say to do with the cord?’ Where do I cut it? Then I remem-
[test of Graduate Educa- bered. I thought for about 30 seconds, was it proximal or
tional Development) at Fort was it distal? Then I remembered to milk it and then tie it.
Sam [Houston], and I got in And I got it. So it came out. Then, I get up and I’m stand-
and went to Vietnam. At Ba ing there with the baby, looking like I’m a hero. And the
Dr Richard Carmona, 17th Surgeon To, Camp A-106, we were, truth of the matter was that the baby was gonna get de-
General of the United States at best, hours from defini- livered no matter what. But I’m standing there doing this,
tive care, so as a Special Forces medic, you’re it. It would looking around, and one of the guys says, ‘Hey, Carmona,
be decades later before I ever did anything [of that mag- hold on a second. Look back down there. There’s another
nitude] as independently—taking head.’ Twins!
care of pneumothoraxes, gunshot
wounds, infectious and parasitic “One of my favorite books is How was medical school?
diseases; combat casualty care; do- Leadership Secrets of Attila My Special Forces training prepared
ing parasitology, making your own the Hun [by Wess Roberts]. me well to flex, adapt, and over-
malaria smears and looking at them Attila knew that the Huns come. . . . [T]he kids in school with
under the microscope. It was the always ate first.” me were anally compulsive; they all
position with the most responsibility, were stressed; they’re all sharing
that you cared for 11 Americans and a couple of hundred information, but they all want to get A’s. And I was like,
[indigenous personnel]. The CIDG [Civilian Irregular De- ‘This is not a stressful situation. You do not know what
fense Group] hospital was in Da Nang; I worked there for stress is, OK, until you’re there with incoming.’ So for me,
a while when I was wounded so I wouldn’t have to leave it was a joy to go to medical school and eventually be-
Vietnam. The medic on the team was [the] most valued come a doctor. The final exam for parasitology was the
member; they would try to not send you on combat mis- same final exam I took at Fort Sam in the 18D course. All
sions like the other teammates, but I prevailed and did the microscopes were set up around the room. [Plasmo-
my share of missions. I felt with my Special Forces training dium] falciparum, [P.] vivax, nematodes, trematodes. . . .
that there was not anything that I couldn’t do. I delivered You went around the room. I maxed it out. I remember
my first baby in a firefight. We were in an ambush, the telling the teacher, ‘I learned all of this stuff in Fort Bragg
firefight ends, and we went on a BDA [Battle Damage As- as a Special Forces medic. And besides that, almost every
sessment]. There’s a lady in a rice paddy. She’s laying there one of these diseases that are here, I treated in a combat
and I’m looking, and she’s about to deliver. It was funny situation.’ The professor says to me, ‘I never treated any
because the area was secure, we had a perimeter set up of them.’ I skipped my last year of medical school and
then with the [indigenous personnel], and she’s laying graduated as the honor graduate.

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