Dentists continue to answer call to military service across the globe
Joint Base Balad鈥擠r. Martin Hritz is back in Iraq, his e-mails picking up where he signed off four years ago from his first combat zone deployment as a U.S. Army Reserve dentist.
He checked in recently with “an update on Mobilization’09,” telling us of “rigorous” combat training in first aid, weapons and maneuvers such as “Humvee rollover” and “convoy op(eration)s” in preparation for re-deployment. That was on his way in by way of Kuwait. In a subsequent “Hello From JBB, I hope you get this message attached and the pictures,” Dr. Hritz writes, “We finally made it here, safe, and have started at the dental clinic. And what a great clinic it is. There are seven dentists all together and many amenities I didn’t get last mob.”
Hello, again, doctor.聽
JADA readers may recall meeting Dr. Hritz as one of the March 2005 “Voices from the front” dentists sharing their stories of war, an enthusiastic communicant offering electronic content and digital photo coverage and signing off, as ever, “Peace, Marty.” On his way out of Iraq the first time around, in a message sent after that Journal of the ADA was published, Dr. Hritz wrote “to thank everyone for their care packages, e-mails and support and generosity to the troops over here” and to express his “great joy” on returning home.
Then a captain, now a major, Dr. Hritz is one of many dentists in all the military services, active duty and reserves, serving U.S. efforts in Iraq, Afghanistan and internationally. We are pleased to share reports of their activities, including Dr. Hritz’s self-initiated communications as well as others from media and military services, with ADA News and ADA News Today readers.
For example, the Atlanta-based media service Digital Video and Imagery Distribution System, Crawford Communications, Inc., offered the ADA News a photo of a traveling Combined Joint Special Operations Task Force-Afghanistan dentist “extracting a rotten tooth” from a village elder at a clinic near Firebase Thomas in Qanati, Shindand District, Herat Province. DVIDS quoted the unnamed dentist as saying the village elder, Arbov Zacharia, made another appointment “to come in and shake my hand. He kept pointing at the extraction site and giving me the thumbs up. It’s nice to know your work is appreciated.”
Meanwhile, Dr. Hritz says “things are heating up literally and figuratively” since his early spring arrival at Joint Base Balad. “We hit 106 degrees this week (of April 26), but it was a dry heat. And with the warm weather came the mortar and rocket attacks. Apparently, the terrorists like to work in the summer heat.” He offered photos of “the giant bomb blast barriers in front of our dental clinic” and “me next to the Archbishop of Military Services USA Timothy Broglio (who) came for our Good Friday mass; he is from Cleveland (Ohio)” and “J-15, my CHU (container housing unit).”
“Things are going well here,” the doctor writes. “We are as busy as ever at the dental clinic. We are working Monday through Saturday here. We get off at 3:30 on Saturday and that is when we try to plan something to see on base (since we never get off the base),” adding that “it’s a pretty big cage and there are some pretty cool things that we get to see on base.”
He wants you to know he’s cheering on the teams back home, “Go CAV’s” (the pro basketball Cleveland Cavaliers), and says, “I trust that everyone is surviving the swine flu over there. Well, I hope you all have a great week, and let’s get some wins for the (major league baseball Cleveland) Indians. Peace, Marty.”
P.S., he ends these e-mails from the combat zone, the address here is MAJ Martin Hritz, Joint Base Balad, 360th Medical Co. (D/S), APOAE 09391.