The Source for Navy News
NNMC and NIH Partner for Research
Story Number: NNS021108-17
Release Date: 11/13/2002
By Journalist 3rd Class Rebecca Horton, National Naval Medical Center
BETHESDA, Md. (NNS) -- Rear Adm. Donald C. Arthur, Commander National Naval Medical Center (NNMC), and Stephen Ficca, associate director for research services at the National Institutes of Health (NIH), signed a real estate agreement that brings the NNMC campus one step closer to housing the nation's first all-inclusive Center for Musculoskeletal Research.
The agreement is a 20-year lease of buildings 17, 18 and 21 on the Bethesda compound to NIH. These buildings, previously occupied by the Naval Medical Research Command, were vacated in July 2001, when the command moved to Silver Spring, Md.
While NNMC had the space, NIH had the idea brewing for their new research center. What NIH needed was space for new construction of a research facility or appropriate available buildings for renovation. They didn't have the resources that they needed.
NIH does have musculoskeletal research being conducted at this time, but in a conference held by the National Institute for Arthritis and Musculoskeletal and Skin Diseases (NIAMS) in 1999, they realized that they needed to bring together all existing and future research into a single, coordinated, well-funded research strategy.
NIAMS noticed that several institutes among NIH were conducting musculoskeletal research, but without coordination or common agendas. As a result, the research in progress at that time was inadequate in scope and depth to meet the healthcare needs of the nation.
"The renovation for this new research center is projected to be complete in two and-a-half years," said Capt. James DeVoll, leader, neuro-musculoskeletal service line.
"Our patients are going to receive great benefits from the center once it is open, because our staff will have an addition of world-class experts in sub-specialty areas.
"Our doctors will have opportunities to receive training from a new set of expert resources," said DeVoll.
Although the center will not be open until 2005, renovations are being done, and NNMC and NIH are making plans for the new center.
For more news about National Naval Medical Center, go to www.nnmc.med.navy.mil.
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