An official website of the United States government
A .mil website belongs to an official U.S. Department of Defense organization in the United States.
A lock (lock ) or https:// means you’ve safely connected to the .mil website. Share sensitive information only on official, secure websites.

Home : News : Article View
NEWS | Aug. 11, 2006

Incoming Air Surgeon's vision: building partnerships, mental health focus

By Sgt. Jim Greenhill National Guard Bureau

SNOWBIRD, Utah - Alliances with civilian public health specialists and state agencies and a focus on mental health are among the priorities of Col. (Dr.) William "Chip" Riggins, the National Guard Bureau's incoming air surgeon.

Riggins - scheduled to assume the Air Surgeon's responsibilities Sept. 1 as successor to Col. (Dr.) Randall Falk, attended Readiness Frontiers 2006 held at the Snowbird Ski & Summer Resort east of Salt Lake City July 31.

Topics discussed during Readiness Frontiers - part intensive training venue, part forum for a military exercise, part networking opportunity - mirrored the vision Riggins' outlined for his new job.

Those topics included responding to natural and manmade disasters, planning, training, mental health and bioenvironmental engineering.

"There's not a big direction change," Riggins said. "Some of our recent deployments and the medical support that we were able to provide to those have borne out that our training is on target and that what we're providing our folks has them prepared to support the Guardsmen and also to support their communities."

Riggins outlined a vision of a medical Air Guard career field offering a medical smorgasbord of capabilities, doing more with fewer people, partnered with civilian agencies, highly trained and nimble.

According to Falk, the U.S. Air Force Medical Service is "rightsizing" from 39,000 uniformed members in the 1990s to 10,500. But meanwhile the Air National Guard component of that force has gone from never having deployed more than 0.2 percent of its medical capability to deploying 16 percent and doing business with more than 17,000 patients during Hurricane Katrina alone.

Hurricane Katrina was an example of the nimbleness of the Air National Guard community.

"Early on, our medical assets were asked to be available to places like the Superdome and the [New Orleans] Convention Center," Riggins said. "But once the population was taken care of we shifted, and we became the health care for the first responders, for the National Guardsmen. We can shift gears on the fly, and we can do both [civilian and military healthcare]."

Riggins' experience includes stints as state surgeon for the Texas National Guard and chair of the Texas Medical Association Council on Public Health.

Among issues he said he'll be emphasizing in his new job:

  • Strengthening relationships at the state level with public health officials. "Making sure that the Guard in our state role is connected to them at the hip is very important," he said. "We're one of the relatively few providers of surge capacity that cities and states can look to for medical support."
  • Strengthening relationships throughout the Department of Defense and with sister services.
  • Supporting the Air National Guard mission. "Making sure that medical support is appropriate and is available and is of the best quality that we can provide to our Airmen and Soldiers," Riggins said.
  • Responding to new missions such as the increased use of unmanned aerial vehicles.
  • Balancing what LTG H Steven Blum, chief of the National Guard Bureau, calls the National Guard's home and away games. "We take the skills that we learned to support the Air Force and its deployment mission and apply those to our homeland contingencies," Riggins said. "We can bring the same medical skills and support that is increasingly in demand to support our away game and are increasingly recognized as relevant and needed for our homeland security plans."
  • Being prepared for potential challenges such as bird flu, disasters or terrorist attacks.

Mental health is of special focus.

"Readiness Frontiers 2006 will see the beginning of a whole new approach to the growing problem of PTSD [Post Traumatic Stress Disorder] and mental health issues in the Guard," said Falk, the outgoing Air Surgeon.

It's a priority Riggins expects to inherit.

"Responsible community members all understand the importance of knowing CPR [Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation]," Riggins said. "We think that the same thing eventually will apply to the mental health arena. Psychological first aid - making sure that from the average citizen on the street trying to help out [after a disaster] to first responders that we don't make those problems worse. Instead of leaving mental health to the psychologists and to the experts, we're taking it down to a level where those important interventions can be done by our frontline medics."

And it's a priority that Riggins is clearly optimistic about.

"We understand that as our communities try to build resiliency - and I'm talking about psychological resiliency - to disasters and terrorism, we believe that that begins with us, that if anyone in the community can do it and has that built-in resiliency … it's our Airmen and Citizen-Soldiers," he said.

 

 

Related Articles
U.S. Air National Guard civilian firefighters, assigned to the Vermont Air National Guard Fire Department, pose in front of the fire truck that was the first on scene, South Burlington, VT, June 4, 2025. These firefighters provided the first fire truck on scene to a local fire.
Vermont Air Guard First on Scene of South Burlington Fire
By Airman Raymond LaChance, | June 4, 2025
SOUTH BURLINGTON, Vt. – Doireann Chesbrough, a civilian firefighter for the Vermont Air National Guard Fire Department, was sitting next to the radio in the dayroom of the station as the sun began to set over the Green...

Paratroopers from the Colorado National Guard and the Jordanian Armed Forces stand together before the first joint Colorado-Jordan airborne Friendship Jump, Watkins, Colorado, April 23, 2025. Members parachuted from a CH-47 Chinook as part of an event to strengthen interoperability and deepen the partnership between the two forces.
Airborne Operation Strengthens Colorado Guard, Jordan Partnership
By Senior Airman Melissa Escobar-Pereira, | June 4, 2025
CENTENNIAL, Colo. – In a display of cooperation and capability, Soldiers from the Colorado Army National Guard and the Jordanian Armed Forces recently conducted a joint airborne operation in Watkins, Colorado.The April 23...

Army Guard Soldiers assigned to Regional Command-East of the NATO-led Kosovo Force mission, also known as KFOR, host a multinational non-commissioned officer academy, referred to as the Jungleer Academy, at Camp Bondsteel, Kosovo, May 8, 2025. 11 Sergeants Major from seven countries shared their experience with the soldiers, and many nations showcased their weapons, gear, vehicles and took a flight or hoisted in the UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter.
Army Guard Soldiers in Kosovo Host Inaugural Event for Non-Commissioned Officers
By Sgt. Cheryl Madolev, | June 4, 2025
CAMP BONDSTEEL, Kosovo – National Guard Soldiers assigned to Regional Command-East of the NATO-led Kosovo Force mission recently hosted an inaugural multinational event for non-commissioned officers (NCOs), focusing on...