Dr. Mike McLoughlin outfitting veteran Johnny Matheny with a Myo-controlled prosthetic arm

Dr. Mike McLoughlin outfitting veteran Johnny Matheny with a Myo-controlled prosthetic arm, 2015

Dr. Wei-Ping Andrew Lee (front center) and Iraq war veteran Brendan Marrocco (on Lee’s left).

Dr. Wei-Ping Andrew Lee (front center) and Iraq war veteran Brendan Marrocco (on Lee’s left), 2013

Today, there are researchers in various Hopkins departments who are engaged in projects for the Department of Defense. Their areas of study, not unlike those of their predecessors during World War I, range widely from the problems of infectious disease and wound care to the issues of mental health and reconstructive surgery. These are a few of those projects:

Bloomberg School of Public Health

Dr. Ellen Silbergeld: studying the role of the microbiome in mediating service members’ response to toxic agents
Dr. Ellen MacKenzie: leading the military extremity trauma research consortium
Drs. Sean Prigge and Gary Ketner: working to help combat malaria as a big impediment to occupational exposure related to military service
Drs. Holly Wilcox and Zachary Kaminsky: assessing risk for behavioral health problems and suicide risk in service members and veterans

Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Department of Plastic and Reconstructive Surgery

Dr. Wei-Ping Andrew Lee: upper extremity/face/genitourinary transplantation

Wilmer Eye Institute and Whiting School of Engineering/Johns Hopkins School of Medicine, Department of Biomedical Engineering

Dr. Jennifer Elisseeff: working to develop new biomaterials that would significantly improve the care of severely wounded service members

Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, Department of Dermatology

Dr. Luis Garza: stem cell work involving the extremities that would benefit amputees

Johns Hopkins University, Applied Physics Laboratory

Dr. Mike McLoughlin: engineering prostheses with functional capabilities similar to those of native limbs

Johns Hopkins University, School of Nursing

A century later, the School of Nursing remains closely linked to the American Red Cross. Nancy McKelvey (class of ’64) served as the Chief Nurse of the American Red Cross from 1997 to 2008. In that capacity, she championed training in disaster relief, and she even coordinated programs and studies with the Johns Hopkins School of Nursing. Jean Waldman Shulman (class of ’64) has also worked as a full-time volunteer historian with the American Red Cross.

The US Army Nurse Corps also boasts several Hopkins alumni.