North Versailles man hopes to continue Army service through pandemic response

Bill Roland never hesitated when he was called to serve his country, and fighting the coronavirus pandemic is no different.

After receiving an email from the VFW asking for retired military medical personnel to join the front lines, the 69-year-old former Army nurse immediately volunteered.

“I’ve been medical since 1988,” said Roland, of North Versailles. “I’ve been through a lot of stuff. This is new, but I’ve been through traumas and everything else. As long as you use universal precautions and use common sense, I think it’ll be OK.”

The Army sent out emails in March to retired personnel, gauging the interest of retired officers, non-commissioned officers and soldiers who would be willing to assist in the coronavirus response, according to a post on the VFW website.

Officials are looking for those who are still qualified as critical care officers, anesthesiologists, nurse anesthetists, critical care nurses, nurse practitioners, emergency room nurses, respiratory specialists and medics, as long as they are not currently working at a hospital or medical facility.

So far over 17,000 people answered the call for service, The Army Times reported, and officials are sifting through applicants to find eligible volunteers.

Roland said he received an initial inquiry last week. He is now hoping for the call telling him he is being deployed.

A lifetime of service

Roland spent most of his life serving his country after enlisting as a high school senior in 1969, following in the footsteps of his dad and grandfather who both served in the Navy.

Between 1969 and 1978, Roland served in the Navy as a boatswain on destroyers, painting the ships and maintaining the rigging, deck equipment and smaller crafts. During that time he traveled to the Mediterranean, North Atlantic and Cuba, although he was never deployed to Vietnam despite serving during the war.

“I was kind of disappointed, actually,” Roland said. “You join to serve, and at that time that’s what the service was.”

After being discharged in 1978, Roland starting working at the Edgar Thomson Works steel mill in Braddock before going back to school to become a registered nurse.

In 1994, Roland got a second chance at serving his country after meeting with an Army recruiter while working at UPMC Presbyterian hospital in Oakland. Roland joined the ranks of the former 339th Combat Support Hospital, of Moon Township, as an operating room nurse.

He aided in minor field surgeries, set up medical assistance programs and offered services from doctors, pharmacies and dentists to community members in Kosovo and in cities across Central America.

The moment he’s most proud of is when he flew a Kosovar child to the United States for a life-saving surgery. She had been diagnosed with a heart condition that prevented her blood from receiving adequate oxygen, often giving her a blue hue.

“It made your tour good,” Roland said about helping people. “It made you feel good.”

Roland is hoping to regain that feeling by providing aid to parts of the country severally impacted by the coronavirus that causes covid-19.

Those who are deployed could be sent to hot spots across the country or to fill in at bases where other health care workers were deployed from, he said.

“If the unit of Fort Hood gets deployed to California to help with covid-19, you can go to Fort Hood and take their spot,” Roland said. “Or, they may call you up and say we’re putting a group together to go to New Orleans to help. You just don’t know, and you don’t know for how long.”

Other branches of the military, especially the National Guard, have already been deployed across the country.

According to an April news release, about 850 Pennsylvania National Guard members are supporting virus testing sites in Montgomery County, distributing food with the Greater Pittsburgh Community Food Bank and setting up medical stations in Glen Mills.

Across the country, almost 27,000 Air and Army National Guard members are supporting coronavirus response plans implemented by state governors.

For Roland, the call for service is something he’s felt throughout his career.

“I’ve always put service before self,” he said.