Robert Miller doesn’t know how to retire. Not really.
As the new executive director of the Military Health Institute at UT Health San Antonio, the retired lieutenant general will oversee daily operations of the unique facility. With a small alphabet following his name in academic accolades, Miller finished his tenure as surgeon general of the U.S. Air Force and Space Force in June and assumed his new role in October.
In an exclusive interview with the San Antonio Report, Miller made light of the short-lived longevity of his retirement.
“My wife told me she’d divorce me if I was at home full time,” he said jokingly. “No, I mean — I was so not ready to retire, even though I was kind of in a terminal job because when you become the Surgeon General, it’s a three-year tour … and so I’ll be honest, I just I’m not a person who does well with nothing to do.”
The former pediatrician said he’s particularly excited about how he can help shape the institute, as he’ll be only the second executive director at its helm since its inception in 2014. The institute is a collaboration with the U.S. Department of Defense and the Department of Veterans Affairs and focuses on military-related research, education, clinical care and engagement.
Miller joins UT Health San Antonio with more than 30 years of service in the Air Force, where he held several top leadership roles. In his career, Miller served as a command surgeon, director of education and training and director of medical operations.
“We are excited to welcome retired Lt. Gen. Robert Miller to the Military Health Institute,” said Dr. Robert Hromas, acting president of UT Health San Antonio. “Dr. Miller’s exceptional leadership skills will be instrumental in driving the Institute’s initiatives forward and continuing its mission to improve the lives of service members, veterans and their families.”
During Miller’s tenure as surgeon general, he advised the Secretary of the U.S. Air Force, the Air Force Chief of Staff, the Space Force Chief of Space Operations and the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Health Affairs concerning the health of the air expeditionary force, airmen and guardians. Miller also authorized the delivery of medical resources worldwide for the Air Force Medical Services, developing plans and programs to support medical missions.
He entered active duty in 1985 as a Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences medical student, completed his residency at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base in Ohio in pediatrics and then completed a fellowship in developmental-behavioral pediatrics at Madigan Army Medical Center in Fort Lewis, Washington.
Miller told the Report he’s excited for his new role because San Antonio’s military health institute is unlike any other he knows of in the United States.
“How do you sync the goodness that’s going on in a university — in this case UT Health — with the needs of a robust military community?” he said. “In my new role, I’m looking for opportunities to bring these things together.”
The following interview has been lightly edited for clarity and length.
Q: Tell us about your early life. Where did you grow up? When did you decide to join the military?
A: I grew up in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I come from a family of steel workers, so to be honest, I was the first one to go to college in my family. I’m an only child, and had very supportive parents who knew that my dream was to become a doctor. I really wasn’t planning to go into the military, but to be fair the cost of medical school scared me to death and so that was the original reason I enlisted. I thought I’d do my time and get out and that would be it, but I ended up being accepted and going to the military medical school after college — the Uniformed Services University, which is in Bethesda, Maryland, outside of D.C. I went in because of money and stayed for a whole different reason — because I kind of fell in love with the military and the esprit de corps and the family and the community.
Q: Tell us about your journey to becoming a pediatrician.
A: I went to a very small liberal arts college in southwestern Pennsylvania called Washington and Jefferson College that you’ve probably never heard of, but it’s kind of a pre-med, pre-law factory. I was a double major in biology and chemistry — I’d probably do that differently now. From there I went to USUHS and decided that I wanted to be a pediatrician. I loved working with kids, so I went to do my residency of Pediatrics in Ohio, through the military at a civilian children’s hospital — Dayton Children’s Hospital — and then a little bit down the road I did a fellowship in developmental behavioral pediatrics in Washington. I kind of fell in love with kids with special needs, and there’s not a lot of developmental pediatricians in the military, so I thought I’d do that the rest of my career and would have been happy as a clam doing that — but about 10 years into my career, I had a leadership opportunity, and so I took that path.
Q: And how did you become the Surgeon General from there?
A: From 2010 on, I’ve been doing different leadership jobs that ultimately resulted in my having the honor of being the Surgeon General for the Air Force, and then also the Space Force, our new service. But I never stopped seeing patients. It was just like maybe one day a month, because I enjoyed it. Now, getting to transition to this job — I couldn’t think of a better position to be in, not only for the mission here, but also for being in San Antonio. We have some family nearby, and it just meets so many of my wife and my needs, and we’re done moving. So this is home now.
Q: What was it like being Surgeon General?
A: There are about 30,000 medics in Air Force medicine and then you have the Air Force itself and the Space Force — there are not different medics taking care of Space Force guardsmen. So it’s Air Force medics that support both, and that’s why I was wearing two hats. I had to report to the chief of the Space Force and the chief of the Air Force. Maybe down the road that’ll change, but not yet. And then there was another large group of Guardsmen and Reservists that all had medics — another 10,000 of each, ballpark. So the Secretary of the Air Force and chief kind of set a mission, and we are there to support it and make sure that at the 70-some military treatment facilities that we have scattered across the globe, that those medics are ready to take care of any mission — whether that’s deliver routine health care like you would get if you just went to your doctor, or maybe deploy because of a natural disaster, or even a conflict — something that we train for, and it’s why you have a Military Health System. It was just a privilege to serve.
Q: Why are you’re excited for this new role?
A: The focus is on improving the health of active duty members and veterans and their families. The prior director was somebody I knew well, an Air Force retired two-star general, Dr. Byron Hepburn, and between himself and the former president of UT Health Science Center, they created this military health institute, which is unique. It doesn’t exist in any other UT campuses, and there’s really nothing quite like it, actually, when you look across the U.S. My task will be to continue to grow and expand what Dr. Hepburn was working on.