Been in private practice for 10 years, thinking about enlisting. Have some questions....

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honmd

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Hi everyone,

I'm a radiologist who has been in private practice for 10 years. I'm currently thinking about enlisting, but have some questions. If anyone has some input, I'd really appreciate it!

1) Is there a way to find out where I will be stationed prior to enlisting? And how much control do I have once I am enlisted (e.g., can they put me in North Dakota?)

2) How long is the military contract for (i.e., if they DO put me in North Dakota and my family is unhappy, how long am I stuck there before I can leave the military and go back to the private sector?)

3) What is the best branch of the military to join? Is there really any difference between an AF radiologist and an Army radiologist?

Thank you!! :)

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It would help to know your motivations for doing this. In many cases, there isn't too much that being a contractor or GS employee at an MTF can't give you that being in uniform will, minus a decent number of the headaches.
 
Hi everyone,

I'm a radiologist who has been in private practice for 10 years. I'm currently thinking about enlisting, but have some questions. If anyone has some input, I'd really appreciate it!

1) Is there a way to find out where I will be stationed prior to enlisting? And how much control do I have once I am enlisted (e.g., can they put me in North Dakota?)

2) How long is the military contract for (i.e., if they DO put me in North Dakota and my family is unhappy, how long am I stuck there before I can leave the military and go back to the private sector?)

3) What is the best branch of the military to join? Is there really any difference between an AF radiologist and an Army radiologist?

Thank you!! :)
If you're already in practice as a full time radiologist, you probably wouldn't be too happy as a full time active duty officer. For starters, you'd take a steep pay cut, you'd lose a lot of flexibility, your scope of practice would be narrowed, etc etc. Consider joining the reserves if you're really interested in joining the military. colbgw02 makes good points as well.
 
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To start out with, you are not enlisting. Physicians are officers, and officers do not enlist, they are commissioned. A minor point, but something that is a bit grating in conversation. As a radiologist, it is a bit like someone talking about an "IVP" or "dye." Just a hint for moving forward.

If you decide to join, you will sign a document that will likely have in big, black, bold letters right above where you sign something like "This document contains the sole agreement between you and the government. Anything anyone else has promised you is not valid." When they say that, they mean it. If it is not in writing, it does not mean a thing.

On a basic level you have no control over where you are assigned. The only leverage you have is to leave the service - assuming that you have that ability. Now, as you have more time in, that changes a bit. As you gain in rank and experience, you also gain the ability to refuse assignments - up to a point.

Your situation is a bit unique in that it sounds like you finished training. The majority of physicians who enter the military do so to cover their medical education expenses. As a result, they end up with a significant service commitment. I don't know off the top of my head what the commitment is for fully trained physicians who join.

It is tough to say definitively what service is best for you. Especially as a radiologist, you are not going to have the hassles - or the potential benefits - of a primary care physician. The one major difference is that the Air Force has a lot of small bases, while the Navy and the Army have a smaller number of larger bases. To put that another way, in the AF there is a good chance you are going to end up in North Dakota.

The next step would be to talk to a Health Professions Recruiter.
 
First, a point on terminology. You would not be "enlisting". Enlisting means you are joining as an enlisted person the way someone out of highschool would. You would join by "commissioning" as an officer. More specifically physicians, lawyers, clergy, etc. accept a direct commissioned as a physician which means you are being granted a commision based on your unique skillset. This differentiates them from a "line officers" (those filling combat leadership roles) who receives a commissioned through a screening process such as ROTC, the military academies, or Officer Candidate School.

1) None. You have some say especially as an attending with a decade of experience but you're setting yourself up for frustration if you're not ready to be told to live somewhere you hate.

2) Initial contracts are for 8 years. You will have N number of years on active-duty with the remainder in the Inactive Ready Reserve (IRR) which is essentially just having your name on the list to be called up if they need people. N is generally 4 years but I've heard of as little as 2 for a fully trained physician.

3) Depends what you want. The Army seems to be better at getting people the type of job they want. The Navy probably has the best duty stations on average. The Air Force is probably the most civilian in terms of lifestyle and location.

I can't see a good reason to join as a fully trained radiologist. Maybe the Reserve if reading films in Iraq or Afghanistan sounds great. You'll make less money with less freedom and you generally won't be filling any of the more "military" sort of roles that have you doing something different from what your civilian job entails...
 
I'm not a physician but I work with EM, ortho, and rad physicians on a regular basis. I'm exposed to all 3 branches as well and in a decent metropolitan/beach area (not North Dakota). The active duty physicians are in for one of two reasons primarily: young, fresh out of training and in for the sole purpose of serving their obligation with no intent of staying in after their contract is up. Or, they want to put on the rank of colonel or general and be a military leader (administrative) rather than work in a clinical setting.
Like others have said, GS or contractor positions would probably be your best bet. If you really want the uniform and the "military experience", go guard or reserve.

I work under one EM doctor who is a contractor but he is also a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard. He lives the civilian life with almost all of his freedom and salary, yet still holds the rank and respect of a high ranking officer. He has been in for over 20 years and has never deployed for the air national guard. This may not be the norm though. Even if you commission with the guard or reserve, you do belong to the government and they can and have every right to make you drop everything and do something you don't want to do or go somewhere you don't want to go.

Again, I have not earned my MD yet, I am just an enlisted medic.
 
I'm not a physician but I work with EM, ortho, and rad physicians on a regular basis. I'm exposed to all 3 branches as well and in a decent metropolitan/beach area (not North Dakota). The active duty physicians are in for one of two reasons primarily: young, fresh out of training and in for the sole purpose of serving their obligation with no intent of staying in after their contract is up. Or, they want to put on the rank of colonel or general and be a military leader (administrative) rather than work in a clinical setting.
Not entirely true. There's plenty of active duty senior officers who are still very clinically active. I have yet to run into a senior medical officer who wanted to be more clinical but was outright forced into a purely administrative role. Most choose the latter path.

I work under one EM doctor who is a contractor but he is also a lieutenant colonel in the Air National Guard. He lives the civilian life with almost all of his freedom and salary, yet still holds the rank and respect of a high ranking officer. He has been in for over 20 years and has never deployed for the air national guard
ANG or reserves is a great way to serve too.
 
Not entirely true. There's plenty of active duty senior officers who are still very clinically active. I have yet to run into a senior medical officer who wanted to be more clinical but was outright forced into a purely administrative role. Most choose the latter path.

Not entirely true indeed. Key word was "primarily". There are always O-5 and 6s still practicing but there are many many more O-3 and 4s simply counting down the days of their contract and most senior officers are in administrative positions. At the 6 large MTFs I've worked in, it's rare to see a full bird still practicing. The ones that are are usually surgeons with extreme lengths of training or flight docs.
 
At the 6 large MTFs I've worked in, it's rare to see a full bird still practicing. The ones that are are usually surgeons with extreme lengths of training or flight docs.

In my smallish dept there are/were 4 O6's who were primarily clinical and two more O6 selects. None still under commitment beyond Multi-year pays. I would say it's not uncommon to see O6's still in primarily clinical roles.
 
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It's probably worth noting that the AF handles O6s differently than the Army and Navy. It's my understanding that in the AF, once promoted to O6, one gets put into a general pool for administrative jobs that are not only non-clinical, but don't even necessarily have anything to do with one's specialty. It's apparently so bad that I've known more than one AF officer go out of his/her way to avoid promotion and retire as an O5 in order to continue practicing.

My Army experience has been a mixed bag. At one medcen, we had a lot of homesteading O6s that were almost entirely clinical. At my current medcen, we're surprisingly light on full birds in that we're down to one - the chair. Until recently we had two, and both were almost entirely administrative - one by choice and one begrudgingly.
 
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It's probably worth noting that the AF handles O6s differently than the Army and Navy. It's my understanding that in the AF, once promoted to O6, one gets put into a general pool for administrative jobs that are not only non-clinical, but don't even necessarily have anything to do with one's specialty. It's apparently so bad that I've known more than one AF officer go out of his/her way to avoid promotion and retire as an O5 in order to continue practicing.

My Army experience has been a mixed bag. At one medcen, we had a lot of homesteading O6s that were almost entirely clinical. At my current medcen, we're surprisingly light on full birds in that we're down to one - the chair. Until recently we had two, and both were almost entirely administrative - one by choice and one begrudgingly.

For the AF, it is true you are beholden to the Colonel's Group when you are an 0-6, but there is still room for some to stay mainly clinical. To avoid pure admin, you can be a dept chair or program director, or be one of the few available in your field, like a pediatric endocrinologist or a neuroradiologist (again in general I am sure some of these folks have been drafted into admin). Or, as I have seen all too often, you can be a complete dud and no one will want you as a leader
and you can stay pure clinical. Incompetence rewarded. Some may ask how a complete dud makes 0-6. Not sure but I imagine it happens in the Army and Navy too. It sure happens elsewhere in America.
 
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