Courtesy photo Ryan Loving, operations manager for the Army’s MC4 program, trains deployed medical units on how to use the IT systems to document patient care in Southwest Asia.

‘‘Loving’s efforts to advance the use of MC4 by the Air Force and to introduce MC4 best business practices globally have been key to the DoD’s Electronic Medical Recording Initiative,” said Lt. Col. Edward Clayson, MC4 commander and product manager. ‘‘We’re providing a proven, standardized means for digitally documenting patient care from which all combat support hospitals and Air Force medical treatment facilities throughout the battlefield can benefit.”

In March 2007, Loving led a team of trainers and system administrators to remote medical treatment facilities in Southwest Asia to integrate a new inpatient medical recording system for MC4. The new system allows inpatient medical records to reach a central repository whereby any medical professional in the world can access a patient’s medical history to ensure continuity of care.

In October 2007, Loving and his team completed the largest training and equipping effort of digital medical recording systems (MC4) to date. In six weeks, Loving and his technical support team trained 300 medical personnel in the 332nd Expeditionary Medical Support Group, and equipped healthcare professionals at the Air Force Theater Hospital in Balad, Iraq, with more than 200 ruggedized systems to aid them in electronically capturing patient records. The effort marked the completion of MC4 equipping all combat support hospitals in SWA. The success of this mission has led to the Army equipping at least a dozen more Air Force hospitals in the combat zone in 2008.

Loving is MC4’s operations manager and is located at the program headquarters on post. A former staff sergeant with the 396th Combat Support Hospital, Loving’s role as MC4’s operations manager at Fort Detrick, Md., is to provide hands-on planning and coordination alongside forward deployed units using the MC4 system.

A frequent traveler to the combat zone, he leads a team of 50-plus MC4 trainers and support personnel scattered throughout combat support hospitals and medical treatment facilities in Southwest Asia, Europe and South Korea. He will be honored at a black-tie ceremony on March 24 in McLean, Va., where he will receive the award alongside top executives from government, industry and academia who had the greatest impact on the government information systems community in 2007. Winners’ accomplishments will also be featured in the March 24 print issue of Federal Computer Week magazine.

Medical Communications for Combat Casualty Care integrates, fields and supports a medical information management system for Army tactical medical forces, enabling a comprehensive, lifelong electronic medical record for all Service members, and enhancing medical situational awareness for operational commanders.