Despite having no previous military experience, prominent cardiologist S. Ward Casscells III joined the Army Reserve in 2005 when he was in his early 50s. He served in Iraq, where he survived at least two attacks and was wounded in a Humvee accident. Casscells, who died Sunday of prostate cancer, returned from Iraq to take on the post of assistant secretary of defense for health affairs. "There was no greater advocate for the value that military medicine provides this nation than Dr. Casscells," Jonathan Woodson, the current assistant secretary of defense for health affairs, said in a statement.