Skip to main content

Military Health System

Test of Sitewide Banner

This is a test of the sitewide banner capability. In the case of an emergency, site visitors would be able to visit the news page for addition information.

Meet the Navy Lieutenant Who’s a ‘Rising Star’ in Health Care IT

Image of Studio photograph of Navy Lt. Travis Kelley. Navy Lt. Travis Kelley was recently recognized as a ‘Rising Star’ for the work he performed while serving as the chief information officer of DHA’s Infrastructure and Operations Division.

Information Technology might seem “boring” to some people, but making sure that doctors, nurses and other health care providers across the Military Health System have working computers and a good network connection is essential to military readiness and daily operations.

That’s what makes the job of Navy Lt. Travis Kelley so important. Kelley, who served as the chief information officer for the Defense Health Agency’s Infrastructure and Operations Division, based at Joint Base San Antonio-Fort Sam Houston, Texas, is a key player in making sure the entire IT infrastructure works as intended, 24/7.

In short, he led a team that provided high-level support to the IT workers at help desks and service centers around the globe – a mission critical job for the entire DHA. He was also instrumental in standing up the agency’s current network operations center and IT acquisition process.

“As the CIO, I was in charge of the operations for the local IT support, basically providing the customer service and troubleshooting, overseeing the network and overseeing cybersecurity,” explains Kelley.

“We provided the IT support to the folks that provide the IT support to the Military Health System.”

Kelley’s work in helping to transform the DHA’s IT support system and processes from 2019 to 2020 recently earned him a prestigious award. He was among 10 ‘Rising Stars’ from throughout the federal IT field who were recognized last month for having an outsized impact on the field early in their careers. The list of ‘Rising Stars’ was published by Federal Computer Week and other Washington, D.C.-area federal information technology trade publications.

These days, Kelley serves as the deputy chief information officer at Navy Medicine Readiness and Training Command in San Diego.

At DHA, Kelley said the day-to-day operations of his post included “making sure all the people we worked with and for were taken care of from an IT perspective.”

This included the basics like making sure that their computers worked, that they had a reliable network to connect to, taking trouble calls, creating tickets and doing advanced troubleshooting for more serious issues. It also included maintaining accreditation, network risk management, and software updates.

After a year or so at DHA, Kelley’s hard work and success was noticed. Kelley was asked to fill more of an “executive officer”-type role within the division, where he was tasked with standing up a network operations center for the entre MHS/DHA, which is now known as the Global Network Operations Center.

“The essentials of what that operations center does is monitoring the entire DHA network, which covers the whole military medical community, and providing that IT infrastructure to all of the military treatment facilities and other ‘lines of business’ across the world,” he explained.

The operations center, which officially stood up in 2019, arose out of a need to monitor issues and remediate them as soon as possible, while keeping those impacted and senior leadership informed.

Kelley also had the additional duty of action officer for the newly created Integrated Project Team, known as an IPT, to decide which software, hardware and contractors would be used within the realm of IT for the DHA.

“As the action officer, I was instrumental in developing, coordinating and participating in all of the activities associated with the acquisition of enterprise IT services,” he said.

The IPT started from the ground up. When developing a team, Kelley said it was essential to have people with real-world, MTF-level IT experience.

Market research was also pivotal. “The whole goal of market research is to find out what’s out there, learn from others that have done similar things, find out what’s innovative, what the future looks like, what are people trying to do,” Kelley said.

“We ended up talking to a bunch of different federal agencies, military services, state governments and industry partners and we accumulated all of that into a strategy for us to standardize and operate.”

The team presented their strategy to DHA’s senior Infrastructure and Operations Division leadership, and they agreed to move forward with their plan.

The IPT’s work was a large part of what DHA’s Chief Information Officer Pat Flanders and Director of Engineering and Technology Transformation Tom Hines discussed as part of their presentation, “Making IT Boring Again – Priorities, Progress, and Pandemics,” at the Health Information and Management System Society’s annual conference in Las Vegas in August.

Within the military, where personnel are moving from facility to facility on a regular basis, standardization is extremely important.

“The goal is to standardize our processes, procedures, tools and everything else associated with IT across the Military Health System so that a doctor, nurse, corpsman, medic or physician’s assistant goes in, and they get the same level of service at any military treatment facility and also, when they move from one facility to another, it’s seamless,” he said.

Kelley said the whole point of making IT “boring” is to provide IT services that are so consistent and standard that the customer – users at MTFs in this case – don’t even need to think about it.

Kelley is a native of Conyers, Georgia, and actually studied Business and Marketing as an undergraduate at Valdosta State University. In 2012, he was accepted into the Health Services Collegiate Program and upon completion of two masters degrees at Marymount University, one in Healthcare Management and another in Information Technology, he was commissioned as a Naval Officer.

“When I joined the Navy, I joined as an officer in the Medical Service Corps and I said, ‘Hey, I’ve got a degree in IT,’ and they saw that and put me into two information technology roles within the Medical Service Corps,” culminating in where he is today.

At the end of the day, Kelley said he wouldn’t have been able to accomplish the work that earned him this award without his whole team’s support.

“I had a great team at the DHA, working for me and above me,” said Kelley. “All of the leaders that I worked for placed their confidence in me that I could work on these large-scale projects and, to me, that’s very humbling.”

You also may be interested in...

Virtual Medical Center Awarded for Ground-Breaking Technologies

Article Around MHS
6/6/2023
Zekelia Rembert and Anna Moore, virtual health nurse care coordinators, coordinate virtual health projects and outline participating military hospitals and clinics at the Virtual Medical Center in Fort Sam Houston, Texas, on May 16, 2019. Virtual health nurse care coordinators train nurses at varying military hospitals and clinics while providing each nurse with 3.5 hours of continued education. Moore created the program. (Photo by Jason W. Edwards, U.S. Army)

The Virtual Medical Center at Brooke Army Medical Center will be recognized for four groundbreaking programs at the 2023 FORUM Information Technology Innovation Awards on June 7 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

U.S. Space Force Details Holistic Health Approach, Continuous Fitness Assessment Study

Article Around MHS
6/5/2023
The U.S. Space Force becomes the first service component to use wearables to keep track of their Guardians fitness and other measures of readiness, with the introduction of the holistic health approach. (Graphic by U.S. Space Force)

The U.S. Space Force is implementing a holistic health approach for uniformed Guardians, including a voluntary two-year continuous fitness assessment study to assess and validate a new fitness concept using wearable devices for the service.

Building DHA Network Took ‘Massive Amount of World-Class Engineering’

Article
5/31/2023
Building DHA Network Took ‘Massive Amount of World-Class Engineering’

How do you take almost 400 military hospitals and clinics, over 398,000 users, half a million medical devices, and 9.5 million beneficiaries, from four different networks, and combine them into one sustainable system?

Effective Health IT Reduces Burnout, Improves Patient Care

Article
5/25/2023
Effective Health IT Reduces Burnout, Improves Patient Care

Information technology and its intersection with military health care was at the forefront of a key discussion at the annual Healthcare Information and Management Systems Society conference, held in Chicago, Illinois, from April 17 to 21.

DHA Senior Leader: ‘Virtual First’ is the Future of Military Health System

Article
5/25/2023
DHA Senior Leader: ‘Virtual First’ is the Future of Military Health System

The Military Health System needs to invest in culture change to truly put the patient first.

Imaging Specialists Look Beyond the Skin

Article Around MHS
5/10/2023
U.S. Air Force Tech. Sgt. Leila Liza Smith, a diagnostic imaging specialist with the 6th Medical Group, practices abdominal ultrasound procedures at MacDill Air Force Base, Florida, on ct. 25, 2022. Smith evaluates the images produced by the ultrasound for abnormalities, such as lumps or nodules on the thyroid gland. (Photo by U.S. Air Force Senior Airman Lauren Cobin)

Diagnostic imaging specialists are medical professionals that use imaging equipment and soundwaves to form images of many parts of the body, known as ultrasounds. They are trained to acquire and analyze these sonographic images so that doctors can diagnose and treat many medical conditions.

Defense Occupational and Environmental Health Readiness System – Hearing Conservation (DOEHRS-HC)

Fact Sheet
5/8/2023

The Defense Occupational and Environmental Health Readiness System – Hearing Conservation (DOEHRS-HC) is an information system designed to support personal auditory readiness and help prevent hearing loss through early detection.

Department of Defense Investing in Wearable Technology That Could Rapidly Predict Disease

Article Around MHS
5/8/2023
U.S. Air Force Airman Katiha Falcon wears a watch at Hill Air Force Base, Utah, on Dec. 3, 2020. The wearable technology is part of a study with the Defense Innovation Unit that will allow detection of illnesses such as COVID-19 within 48 hours. (Photo by Cynthia Griggs, U.S. Air Force)

The Defense Innovation Unit, in partnership with the private sector, has developed a wearable device that was highly successful during the COVID-19 pandemic in identifying infections.

Lab Professionals Play Key Role in Public Health and Patient Care

Article
5/2/2023
Lab Professionals Play Key Role in Public Health and Patient Care

Lab professionals provide value to the MHS and DHA communities.

Crosland Discusses Dawn of Digital Health at HIMSS 2023

Article
4/28/2023
Crosland Discusses Dawn of Digital Health at HIMSS 2023

“My priorities as a combat support agency are about health of the force, and the redesign of our health care system is about health of our patient,” said U.S. Army Lt. Gen. Crosland. “And as an agency, it's about health of our people.”

Blanchfield Army Community Hospital ICU joins DHA’s Joint Tele-Critical Care Network

Article Around MHS
4/18/2023
Blanchfield Army Community Hospital Intensive Care Unit Chief Nurse U.S. Army Maj. Brenda Mitchell preforms a communication check with a nurse at the Defense Health Agency Virtual Medical Operations Center at Naval Medical Center San Diego, California, using the Joint Tele-Critical Care Network, on March 27. (Photo by Justin Moeller, Blanchefield Army Community Hospital

Blanchfield Army Community Hospital is the latest military hospital or clinic in the Military Health System to join the Defense Health Agency’s Joint Tele-Critical Care Network. The JTCCN virtually integrates 24/7 access to highly skilled critical care physicians, or intensivists, from DHA medical centers, or hubs like Naval Medical Center San Diego and Brooke Army Medical Center, with satellite intensive care units at nearly 20 military hospitals or clinics worldwide.

Like a Cable Boss: Connecting Medical Technology

Article Around MHS
4/12/2023
U.S. Air Force Senior Airman Andrea President, a medical information service systems technician, 379th EMDSS, demonstrates using a cable testing device at the 379th EMDG radiology lab at Al Udeid Air Base, Qatar. (Photo by U.S. Air Force 1st Lt. Bayard Lewis)

Inspecting and connecting tiny wires may seem like a small task, but it’s one that has a big effect on medical care that military patients receive in deployed locations like Qatar.

5 Reasons to Download MyCare Overseas App

Article
4/6/2023
5 Reasons to Download MyCare Overseas App

If you live overseas, the MyCare Overseas app makes it easy to manage your health care at home and on the go.

Brooke Army Medical Center Interventional Radiology Offers Less-Invasive Option for Patients with Disc Degeneration

Article Around MHS
3/21/2023
U.S. Air Force Maj. (Dr.) Matthew Taon, interventional radiologist, demonstrates a minimally invasive image guided procedure at Brooke Army Medical Center, Fort Sam Houston, Texas. (Photo by Jason W. Edwards, Brooke Army Medical Center)

You may not have to go "under the knife" to ease debilitating back issues, thanks to a new technology. Find out how surgeons at Brooke Army Medical Center are relieving patients from pain where surgery was once the only option.

Belvoir Hospital Reaches Milestone with Robotic-Assisted Joint Replacement Surgery

Article Around MHS
3/20/2023
Fort Belvoir Community Hospital is the first military hospital in the Defense Health Agency to employ this robotic-assisted platform, and the cutting-edge technology provides the joint replacement surgeons an unparalleled amount of real-time surgical data.  (Photo by Reese Brown, Fort Belvoir Community Hospital)

Would you trust your surgical procedure to a robot? See the cutting-edge technology that's taking Belvoir Hospital's joint replacement surgery into a new era.

Page 1 of 21 , showing items 1 - 15
First < 1 2 3 4 5  ... > Last 
Refine your search
Last Updated: January 31, 2023
Follow us on Instagram Follow us on LinkedIn Follow us on Facebook Follow us on Twitter Follow us on YouTube Sign up on GovDelivery