MACDILL AIR FORCE BASE, Fla. -- Twenty miles from MacDill Air Force Base, in the military and retiree populated community of Brandon, lies a unique satellite unit.
One of only nine geographically-separated medical units in the Air Force, the Brandon Clinic serves more than 16,000 people in the area.
In this small, yet high-paced clinic, they care for more patients than many installation clinics do annually said Staff Sgt. Justin Everhardt, an aerospace medical technician assigned to the 6th Medical Group Brandon Clinic.
The clinic provides a range of specialty services to make care easily accessible to their patients.
“The majority of people we see are dependents and retirees,” said Nilda Hansley, a medical support assistant assigned to the 6th MDG Brandon Clinic. For that reason, we are able to cater our services to fit their needs.”
The clinic is separated into two elements to maximize patient care.
“The Lightning Element consists of family health, pediatric and behavioral health teams seeing over 600 patients weekly,” said Everhardt. “The Thunder Element consists of internal medicine, women’s health and two family health teams seeing over 700 patients weekly.
“We also provide lab, radiology, disease management, pharmacy services and point-of-care immunizations.”
The geographic distance of the clinic brings care closer to the patients who live a substantial distance from the base. Some patients live more than an hour away, and the Brandon Clinic, in turn, shortens their travel time and eases the access to medical care.
Though separated from the main clinic, the Brandon Clinic still remains mission dedicated and upholds the same standard of care.
“We focus on the same mission as the main clinic, which is to ‘prevent, prepare, heal and deploy,’” explained Everhardt. “Even though we don’t see a lot of active duty members, we care for their dependents, which takes away some of the stress they might have when they are gone or getting ready to deploy.”
Separate, yet one team, the medical group works to provide support to their patients, and the Brandon Clinic is essential to that mission by extending the coverage across the area.