Dr. Sean Barbabella, DO, the veteran Navy emergency doctor with a distinguished military service record, currently serves as the official physician to President Donald Trump. With his reputation for combat trauma care from duty deployments in Iraq and Afghanistan, Barbabella released a report not long ago to confirm that Trump is still “in excellent cognitive and physical health.”
President Trump is in superb health, with strong cardiac, pulmonary, neurological, and overall physical function,” wrote Sean Barbabella in a memo published after the president’s annual physical at a Washington, DC-area hospital.
Trump is 78, the oldest president to assume office, even older than Joe Biden, who departed at 82. The report also verified that Trump has scarring on his right ear due to a gunshot wound he received from an assassination attempt last July.
Decorated Military Career of Sean Barbabella with Frontline Medical Innovation
Dr. Barbabella’s reputation was established through years of service in the military. He was stationed in both Afghanistan and Iraq and was wounded during a 2009 explosion caused by an improvised explosive device (IED) and was awarded a Purple Heart for it. The military awarded him the Legion of Merit in 2012 for his work as a division surgeon.
In one alumni magazine for his college alma mater, he was “a trail-blazing doctor of the Mobile Trauma Bay, an armored ambulance big enough to evacuate wounded [veterans] from combat sites.”
He graduated in 1996 from A.T. Still University’s Kirksville College of Osteopathic Medicine in Missouri. He then completed his residency at the Portsmouth Naval Medical Center in Virginia and continued to serve by completing a number of tours of duty in combat zones.
No White House Experience, But Rich Military Medical History
Even though Dr. Sean Barbabella lacks any past experience at the White House medical unit, the Times of London initially broke the news of his appointment to Trump’s team back in the first part of the year. The White House itself did not formally confirm his position until it announced on March 1 that he would administer the president’s physical at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
Most recently, Barbabella commanded the Naval Health Clinic Cherry Point in Havelock, North Carolina. The clinic posted in January that he was departing to accept a new role with the White House medical unit. Previously, he was the executive officer at Naval Medical Center Camp Lejeune in Jacksonville, North Carolina.
Trusted With Presidential Health Amid High-Security Threats
In light of the two assassination plots Trump survived during his recent election—one in Butler, Pennsylvania, and the other in South Florida—Barbabella’s battlefield experience seems particularly germane. His experience of tending to victims of trauma amidst gunfire gives him a unique advantage for the high-stress, high-security surroundings of the White House.
His appointment continues a tradition of having military physicians in the role. During Trump’s first term, Dr. Ronny Jackson and, later, Dr. Sean Conley served as White House doctors. Jackson, a Navy captain and former combat physician, later became a Congressman representing Texas. Conley, also a Navy emergency physician, played a key role in Trump’s treatment during his COVID-19 diagnosis in October 2020.
Dr. Barbabella’s credentials and experience demonstrate intimate knowledge of trauma care and emergency response. Trump’s official physician lends combat-tested medical judgment to one of the highest-stakes medical jobs in the world.