In 2009, the Assistant Secretary of Defense (Health Affairs) requested our AMSARA mission be expanded to include audits and studies of the Disability Evaluation System (DES), establishing the Disability Evaluation System Analysis and Research (DESAR). Under the guidance of the Disability Advisory Council (DAC), our DESAR team issues annual reports and performs the following tasks:

• Examination of tri-service disability evaluation systems using existing AMSARA databases

• Evaluation and description of stages of the military disability evaluation systems

• Design and execution of epidemiologic studies to identify risk factors associated with disability retirement from the military
   

Main Objective: Inform DOD disability policy decisions to improve readiness and lethality by reducing attrition, streamlining the Warfighter’s disability evaluation process, and decreasing replacement time and cost.