Capt. Matthew D. Tadlock, MD, FACS

Dr. Tadlock is a US Navy trauma and general surgeon with more than 22 years of active-duty experience providing health service support on land and sea to US Navy, Marine Corps, and NATO units in the Central and Indo-Pacific Combatant Command areas of responsibility.

He currently serves as officer in charge, Surface Medical Group Pacific, where he helps prepare Fleet Surgical Teams ONE, THREE, FIVE, and NINE for deployment on US Navy amphibious assault ships.

Since 2021, Dr. Tadlock has led the Maritime Surgery Quality Improvement program, a initiative focused on tracking, improving, and standardizing all surgical care performed on US combatant vessels. He also is the editor of the 2023 book designed for maritime surgical teams, Expeditionary Surgery at Sea: A Practical Approach.

Dr. Tadlock is an attending surgeon at the Naval Medical Center San Diego and the Trauma Division at University of California San Diego (UCSD). He is an associate professor of surgery through the Uniformed Services University and associate clinical professor of surgery (volunteer) at UCSD.

He previously served as the trauma specialty leader (2018–2021) and is the current general surgery specialty leader for the US Navy Surgeon General. He also chairs the Committee on Surgical Combat Casualty Care, one of the three Joint Trauma System, Defense Committees on Trauma. Dr. Tadlock previously served as Secretary and is 2024–2025 President of the Excelsior Surgical Society.