USU Office of External Affairs

A new documentary that opened in theaters on March 7, "Fighting for Life," features alumni, students, staff and faculty of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences. The university is a traditional academic health center with a unique focus on military medicine and public health. USU includes a medical school with a graduate program in the biomedical sciences and a graduate school of nursing.

This powerful and emotional documentary focuses on the role USU plays in educating leaders in military medicine and looks at the care they provide to servicemen and women injured in combat. Academy Award-winning filmmaker Terry Sanders produced the documentary, which was the brainchild of Mrs. Tammy Alvarez, president of the "Friends of USU" organization. Alvarez's son, Navy Lt. Bryan Alvarez, is a 2005 graduate of USU.

"I started out to make a film about the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences in Bethesda," said Sanders. "It was to be an in-depth portrait of this very special institution, the 'West Point' of military medicine, which has trained more than 25% of current active duty physicians...and the film grew until it became an odyssey through the world of military medicine in a time of war."

The university's story is told through footage, photos and interviews with a number of students, alumni, faculty and staff. The film focuses on some of USU's unique educational programs, including the first-year Antietam road march, and field training exercises Operation Kerkesner and Operation Bushmaster, as well as several alumni as they care for wounded troops on the battlefield and throughout the patient evacuation system.

Among the many alumni highlighted in the film are:

Dr. Tom Kolkebeck ('91), an Air Force physician who received casualties as the emergency room director at Balad Air Base in Iraq; Dr. Donald Jenkins ('88), who was deployed more than three times to Iraq to lend his expertise as trauma systems medical director; Drs. Warren and Gina Dorlac (both '89), who cared for critically injured patients at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center; and Dr. Paul Pasquina ('91), who as Chief of Physical Medicine and Rehabilitation and as the medical director of the Amputee Program at Walter Reed Army Medical Center, works to improve the quality of life for troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan who have suffered serious injury or lost limbs in service to their country.

The film began with limited engagements in New York; Washington, D.C., Bethesda, Md., Los Angeles, and San Diego throughout the month of March, and in San Antonio in April.

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