SAN ANTONIO -- A one-of-a-kind rehab facility celebrated an anniversary on Friday, January 27, 2012 San Antonio’s Center for the Intrepid turned five.
With a sword chop, the Army’s Center for the Intrepid celebrated a birthday. The advanced rehab center has been serving patients for half a decade now.
“We here in Texas build everything big,” commented Dr. James Ficke, chairman of the department of orthopedics and rehabilitation for San Antonio Military Medical Center (SAMMC). “This is a unique stand-alone facility. We take care of inpatients in the hospital, but everyone here at the Center for the Intrepid is an outpatient.”
Blast injuries have been the hallmark of modern conflicts. Plenty of young men and women have ended up as amputees, needing to re-learn how to live their lives.
That’s where the professional at the Center for the Intrepid come in with knowledge and technology to get these wounded warriors back on their feet, literally.
Over the past five years, the Center has helped 780 service members will all kinds of therapy and prosthetics.
Whether they want to return to duty or retire to civilian life, the injured stay for weeks or months to achieve their personal goals.
“For them to get up and come here every day is just inspiring,” Ficke said. “Their courage to say ‘I don’t want to sit in a wheelchair. I want to walk. I want to run.’ They inspire us.”
Funds donated by 600,000 Americans helped pay for the cost of the $50 million facility.
The Center doesn’t expect the workload to decrease much now that the Iraq war is over. Rehab often lasts years and years.
