History
Fort Leonard Wood and the hospital’s namesake is Major General Leonard Wood. General Leonard Wood attended Harvard Medical School and began his Army career as a Contract Surgeon. He also commanded the "Rough Riders" during the Spanish American War, later serving as the Military Governor of Cuba. General Leonard Wood was the Chief of Staff of the Army from 1910 to 1914 and the only medical officer to have ever held the position.
The original United States Army Hospital built at Fort Leonard Wood, a cantonment style hospital comprising over 2,000 beds, was completed in 1941. The hospital was built to support Fort Leonard Wood, which was constructed as a result of the Army Expansion Program of 1940. The original hospital provided medical care for more than 300,000 troops during the period June 1941 to May 1947. In addition to treating United States service members during World War II, the original hospital provided patient care to the prisoners of war located in a smaller, adjacent health care facility.
Full operation of the US Army Hospital in the old cantonment facility continued until movement to the new General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital (GLWACH) on August 15, 1965.
In 1974, ground was broken for a 180-bed nursing tower and clinic addition. Upon completion in 1977, the new addition had more than doubled the space previously allocated for outpatient clinics and raised the inpatient capacity to approximately 500 beds.
A new humidity controlled, medical supply warehouse was opened in January 1983. The 35,000 square foot facility integrates all of the supply functions within the hospital’s main building and represents a state-of-the-art warehouse facility.
The present facility, a six-story structure, comprises 450,000 square feet of clinic and ward space. The hospital also include a chapel, post exchange / snack bar, patient and medical libraries.
The hospital is currently staffed for 65 beds and offers a full range of medical services to active military personnel, military retirees and family members enrolled in TRICARE Prime. Non-prime patients are seen as space allows.
Comprehensive dental care and 24-hour emergency Dental Care are available on post for service members. Dental clinics maintain a list of dentists off post accepting Concordia Dental Insurance for family members.
GLWACH provides inpatient and outpatient care to more than 36,000 beneficiaries and is staffed by 900 medical, dental, nursing, and administrative personnel. On an average day, the hospital’s staff admits 6.6 patients, fills 1,651 prescriptions, gives 440 immunizations, completes 716 laboratory procedures, takes 285 x-rays, delivers 1 baby, provides self-care instruction and individualized counseling to 100 beneficiaries in its Health Promotion Center, and sees more than 1005 beneficiaries in their outpatient clinics including the Consolidated Troop Medical Clinic (CTMC). Health Promotion and Self-Care classes are available to all.
Recent innovations further enhancing medical services for GLWACH beneficiaries include ‘Dr. Gil’ which is an automated patient appointment reminder system. Dr. Gil calls patients between 1730 and 2055 the evening before their appointment. It informs patients of the time and clinic where they are scheduled (for confidentiality purposes, minors and Behavioral Medicine patients only receive the time of their appointment). The system leaves reminder messages on answering machines and also allows the patient an opportunity to cancel their appointment if necessary.
Off-post medical facilities provide a comprehensive range of primary and specialty health care within the area. There are six hospitals within the surrounding nine-county area, with a total capacity of over 800 beds. The largest of these include the 259 bed Phelps County Regional Medical Center in Rolla, the 99-bed Lake of the Ozarks General Hospital in Osage Beach, and the new 41-bed Breech Medical Center in Lebanon.
Tertiary medical care is available in less than two hours from Fort Leonard Wood. St. John’s and Cox Hospitals are located in Springfield and the University of Missouri Medical Center is located in Columbia. Truman Veterans Hospital is also located in Columbia.
General Leonard Wood Army Community Hospital (GLWACH) is accredited by the Joint Commission on Accreditation of Healthcare Organizations, the College of American Pathologists, the American College of Radiology, the American Association of Blood Banking, the Food and Drug Administration, and a member of the American Hospital and Missouri Hospital Associations. At GLWACH, the staff strives to provide excellent medical care in a kind and compassionate environment. They take seriously their stewardship of health care and motto "Compassion and Courage".