UMDNJ Presents "The Wounds Of War: Healthcare On & Off The Battlefield" On Friday, Oct. 23

Main Category: Veterans / Ex-Servicemen
Article Date: 20 Oct 2009 - 16:00 PDT

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Some veterans provided health care on and off the battlefield, treating serious physical injuries or mental trauma. Others served in combat and sustained injury. On Friday, Oct. 23, they come together on one panel to publicly share their stories, as the University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ) presents The Wounds of War: Healthcare On & Off the Battlefield, the latest event in UMDNJ's President's Lecture Series.

The discussion will focus on meeting the health challenges of the men and women who have served in Iraq and Afghanistan. It will take place from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. in the UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School's Medical Sciences Building, Room 552, 185 South Orange Avenue, Newark, New Jersey.

This is the second of a series of conversations UMDNJ has organized around health topics of national interest. In May, the University introduced the President's Lecture Series with a panel discussion on healthcare reform and its impact on academic medical centers.

Moderating "The Wounds of War: Healthcare On & Off the Battlefield" will be Kenneth Swan, M.D., professor of surgery at the UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School and a veteran of Vietnam and Desert Storm, and Cherie Castellano, M.A., L.P.C., director of the "New Jersey Veterans For You" program, which provides counseling and other services to military veterans and their families.

Speakers on the panel will include:

- Frank Dos Santos, D.O., a graduate of the UMDNJ-School of Osteopathic Medicine and now a student in the Masters in Public Health program at the UMDNJ-School of Public Health. Dos Santos headed a U.S. Marines shock trauma platoon in Iraq. A U.S. Navy Commander, Dos Santos remains on active duty while also serving as an emergency room physician at Robert Wood Johnson University Hospital.

- Joseph Costabile, M.D., a graduate of UMDNJ-Robert Wood Johnson Medical School (Camden), is a surgeon in private practice in South Jersey. Costabile served at a military hospital in Kuwait in 2005 and at a field facility in Iraq in 2008.

- Audrey Brooks, M.S.N., R.N., is an instructor at the UMDNJ-School of Nursing (Stratford). Brooks was a flight nurse based in Landstuhl, Germany, the primary point to which the wounded are flown from Iraq and Afghanistan.

- Joseph Nyzio, Sgt. U.S. Army (Ret.), was wounded in Iraq in June 2004 while attempting to reclaim an Iraqi police station in Sadr City. He now works for the New Jersey Department of Military and Veterans Affairs.

- Karl Coutinho is a UMDNJ-New Jersey Medical School student and a member of the New Jersey National Guard's Medical Command, which handles all medical care for Guard members in the state. Coutinho has been active in the on-going reconstitution of returning soldiers.

- Charles "Chuck" Arnold, Master Sgt., New Jersey Army National Guard (Ret.), is a peer counselor with the "New Jersey Veterans For You" program and was among the UBHC volunteers who conducted one-on-one psychoeducational sessions with New Jersey Army National Guard members returning from year-long deployments to Iraq. Arnold served two combat tours of duty, one in Cuba with the 1st Marine Division in 1966 and one in Vietnam with the 3rd Marine Division from 1966 to 1967.

A special welcome is extended to veterans and their families.

Source
University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey (UMDNJ)