U.S., Vietnam forces share ideas, knowledge during PACIFIC ANGEL 13-3

  • Published
  • By Staff Sgt. Sara Csurilla
  • 13th Expeditionary Air Force
DONG HOI, Vietnam --  When two countries are on opposite sides of the world, it's not hard to believe that when it comes to things like health care, they might perform them a little differently.

This is one of the major reasons why the Subject Matter Expert Exchange programs have taken place in Vietnam, as part of Operation PACIFIC ANGEL 13-3.

Operation PACANGEL 13-3 is a joint and combined humanitarian assistance exercise held in various countries several times a year and includes medical, dental, optometry, engineering programs, along with SMEEs. More than 50 U.S. military members deployed to Vietnam for PACANGEL 13-3 to partner with local non-governmental organizations and host-nation military forces.

The SMEEs are one of the three pillars in PACANGEL operations and happen every year. However, the subjects change each time based on what the host country is interested in learning and sharing.

Before and throughout the operation, a total of five SMEEs were conducted; an Aerospace Physiology and Aviation Medicine SMEE at the Vietnam Military Institute of Aviation Medicine in Hanoi, a Prenatal/Obstetrics Emergency SMEE, a Medical Public Health/Infection control SMEE and a Construction Safety SMEE in Quang Binh Province.

"The SMEEs were definitely an exchange from both sides," said Lt. Col. Brendan Noone, Chief of Medical Operations, Pacific Air Forces, Command Surgeons Office, Cooperative Health Engagement Division at Joint Base Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. "We learned how they do things when it comes to training their pilots and caring for their people, and they learned ways we would handle the same situations, just a little differently."

Noone explained that although some of their systems are very different from the way certain things are done in the U.S., their system works and his Vietnamese counterparts were really just looking for ways to modernize.

With experts from both countries sharing their knowledge and skills with one another, the participants will gain an appreciation for how one another do things as well as carry on what they learned during these essential information exchanges.

"This was a really great experience and I learned so much from the two doctors," said Thai Thi Thu Huong, a student in the Prenatal/Obstetrics Emergency SMEE and physician and instructor at the local health clinic in the Quang Bihn Province. "I know some of the techniques I learned here today will help with maternal care in the future and this is also information I can pass along to my students at the health clinic."

Col. John Fischer, an obstetrics and gynecology doctor at the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center Bethesda, Maryland, and Maj. Matthew Snyder, a Family Medicine doctor from Mike O'Callaghan Federal Medical Center Nellis Air Force Base, Nev., conducted part of the Prenatal/Obstetrics Emergency SMEE where approximately 30 midwives and physicians from Quang Binh Province came to learn from the U.S. Air Force doctors.

"This has been such a great opportunity not only for us to get out and teach the way we do maternal child care, but for us to learn how the Vietnamese do these things," Fischer explained, agreeing with his Vietnamese student.

Regardless of the topic of the SMEE, Noone explained that from determining what exactly is most beneficial to learn from each other, to coming up with an effective teaching program, to the actual execution, the process took anywhere from four to six months to plan.

After all the planning and anticipation of such an multifaceted program, Noone said to see the process come full circle and happen just the way we wanted was "very gratifying."