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Research and Innovation | Health Care Technology | Department of Defense/Veterans Affairs Program Office
Leadership from the Washington, D.C. Veterans Affairs Medical Center visited Walter Reed National Military Medical Center last month to acknowledge the new Joint Incentive Fund (JIF) award between the two centers.
The JIF award focuses on the Department of Defense/VA 3D Printing Consortium for Medical Applications. The total JIF award was for more than $8.8 million with the WRNMMC/3D MAC portion at over $4.1 million for a project length of two years, according to Dr. Peter Liacouras, director of the services for WRNMMC’s 3D Medical Application Center.
In 2002, the 3D MAC opened at the former Walter Reed Army Medical Center (WRAMC), a predecessor of WRNMMC with the former National Naval Medical Center (NNMC), stated Liacouras, who joined the 3D MAC team in 2006. He added that in the late 1990s, an individual at NNMC was doing some 3D printing as well.
In 2007, the Naval Postgraduate Dental School (NPDS), at the then NNMC, started to invest in 3D printing for dental prosthetics, and then in 2011 with the Base Realignment and Closure law, the 3D MAC was relocated from the closing WRAMC to the new WRNMMC, Liacouras explained.
According to Military Health System (MHS) officials, the JIF was established under Section 721 of the FY 2003 National Defense Authorization Act “to provide seed money and incentives for innovative DoD/VA joint sharing initiatives to recapture purchased care, improve quality and drive cost savings at facilities, regional and national levels. JIF is only designated for use by the Veterans Health Administration (VHA) and Defense Health Agency (DHA) entities for direct medical sharing initiatives or for services or systems that facilitate DOD/VA interoperability.”
“Telehealth and 3D printing in health care settings are the wave of the future,” VA Secretary Robert Wilkie recently stated. In March, VA activated its 3D printing network to test 3D designs of medical equipment used by the nation’s health-care providers to combat the COVID-19 pandemic. This effort included developing 3D masks and other critical personal protective equipment (face shields, masks and ventilators) to bolster the nation’s fight against COVID-19.