Throughout history, field medicine has served an important role in the military, disaster response, aid efforts, and more. As technology has evolved, providing hospital level care while in remote regions has become a possibility. At Western Shelter, we create field hospitals that do their best to mimic the care you would find in any hospital around the globe.

Field hospitals can be a complicated subject. Due to the sheer capacity of infrastructure and equipment involved, those looking for field medical solutions often don’t know where to start. Fortunately, field hospitals are generally broken down into different levels, or “Roles”.

Field hospitals are most commonly classified as fitting into one of three different roles. Requirements may differ slightly between agencies, governments, militaries, humanitarian organizations, and others, but generally a field hospital will fall into one of the three roles, even if the specific requirements are not uniform across organizations.

Role I

A Role I Field Hospital is the first form of structured medical support found in the field aside where both primary health care and emergency treatment are administered. Level 1 facilities also typically perform sanitary and preventative dental hygiene treatments.

Role II

A Role II Field Hospital provides more advanced medical support in the field. This includes intensive care, larger wards, and advanced life support. Role II hospitals are supported by basic dental facilities, as well as radiology facilities and laboratory units.

Role III

A Role III Field Hospital is equivalent to a multidisciplinary general hospital. This facility can provide comprehensive medical care for a population of up to 5,000, with the ability to conduct up to 10 surgical procedures a day.

There is no one size fits all solution to field medicine. Our team has experience building facilities that range in size from local neighborhood clinics to large complex field hospitals.

recent projects

East Africa

Puerto Rico

Costa Rica

If you need more information about field hospitals and how we can help with your project, fill out the form below and one of our team members will get in contact.