2015-2016 Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences Application Thread

BU Medical Sciences
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doctorkitten said:
does anyone know if the admissions office is operating during this time or are they all off?

edit: another way of saying: "what the hell is going on"
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They are probably not doing much right now, so I would try to relax until the second week of January. Then you can start freaking out again.
 
Well it's a new week and a new year, the holidays are over (I hope everyone had a good break from med school anxiety) and everyone is back to work, does that mean the adcoms are back in session? Should we resume our stressful phone/mailbox watching? Anyone care to speculate?
 
So I have been waiting on a remedial letter from DODMERB from Dec 17th. Well, I found out today that they have been unable to send the letters out since mid-late Dec. Called DODMERB directly and they clarified what exactly needed to be done. Logged on to the DODMETS (concorde) website and was able to book the remedial appointment I needed.

So if anyone else is waiting on a remedial letters, you may want to try calling DODMERB if you can't figure out exactly what you need to do based on the error codes in your application status.
 
Congratulations, @vrog33! Were you wait-listed at all or were you just accepted? 8 week turnaround seems like you didn't even get put on the waitlist! =O
 
Congratulations on your acceptance. Hoping to see some Navy wait list movement soon, currently on primary wait list. Currently accepted at an outside medical school but hoping to go here.

For all of those currently accepted to the Navy, remember there is really only one or two pros and quite a few cons to Navy medicine:

PROS/CONS NAVY MEDICINE

PRO:
1) Privilege to serve some of the greatest people in the world in all types of deployment settings
2) Location
3) GMO (in my opinion)

CONS:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
4) Military bureaucracy including inability to hire and fire staff, inability to rapidly obtain desired resources, no control over how your practice runs, inability to operative when you want and where you want, inability to hire a medical scribe (huge convenience in private practice world, the orthopaedic surgeon I work for sees about 120-140 patients a week and because of me he does zero documentation except once a week for 10 minutes to sign charts, imagine how nice that is)
5) Location is also a con as it means you are moving every 2 years if you are single and every 3 years if you have a family
6) Chain of command: there have been a lot of stories out there of nurses running clinics which means you are under the control of a nurse, this does not sit well with some folks
7) Deployments mean anywhere to a boat in the middle of the ocean taking sick call to being in the next battle of Fallujah or even taking sick call in the middle of some god forsaken desert
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care

I am sure I can come up with more negative of Navy medicine but it pretty much comes down to if you want to be a Navy military officer more than you want to be a medical doctor and do not mind the nonsense of the military, this is the place for you.

I just thought I would share my thoughts.

Good luck to everyone in their application cycles!
 
premed1000 said:
Congratulations on your acceptance. Hoping to see some Navy wait list movement soon, currently on primary wait list. Currently accepted at an outside medical school but hoping to go here.

For all of those currently accepted to the Navy, remember there is really only one or two pros and quite a few cons to Navy medicine:

PROS/CONS NAVY MEDICINE

PRO:
1) Privilege to serve some of the greatest people in the world in all types of deployment settings
2) Location
3) GMO (in my opinion)

CONS:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
4) Military bureaucracy including inability to hire and fire staff, inability to rapidly obtain desired resources, no control over how your practice runs, inability to operative when you want and where you want, inability to hire a medical scribe (huge convenience in private practice world, the orthopaedic surgeon I work for sees about 120-140 patients a week and because of me he does zero documentation except once a week for 10 minutes to sign charts, imagine how nice that is)
5) Location is also a con as it means you are moving every 2 years if you are single and every 3 years if you have a family
6) Chain of command: there have been a lot of stories out there of nurses running clinics which means you are under the control of a nurse, this does not sit well with some folks
7) Deployments mean anywhere to a boat in the middle of the ocean taking sick call to being in the next battle of Fallujah or even taking sick call in the middle of some god forsaken desert
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care

I am sure I can come up with more negative of Navy medicine but it pretty much comes down to if you want to be a Navy military officer more than you want to be a medical doctor and do not mind the nonsense of the military, this is the place for you.

I just thought I would share my thoughts.

Good luck to everyone in their application cycles!
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Are you trying to convince people to go elsewhere if they get accepted here?
 
soadhead said:
Are you trying to convince people to go elsewhere if they get accepted here?
Click to expand...

Some of the overall themes this person is pointing out is worth considering. Especially the negatives. Military medicine is a similar but also a different calling than medicine in of itself. Signing a contract that will take up at least 15 years of your life without prior experience or looking at all the angles is a foolish move so it is worth considering all points.

However there is some CON points I have to retort against premed1000. I am currently at USUHS but I have no prior military service before medical school so if I get some details wrong please correct.
 
premed1000 said:
Congratulations on your acceptance. Hoping to see some Navy wait list movement soon, currently on primary wait list. Currently accepted at an outside medical school but hoping to go here.

For all of those currently accepted to the Navy, remember there is really only one or two pros and quite a few cons to Navy medicine:

PROS/CONS NAVY MEDICINE

PRO:
1) Privilege to serve some of the greatest people in the world in all types of deployment settings
2) Location
3) GMO (in my opinion)

CONS:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
4) Military bureaucracy including inability to hire and fire staff, inability to rapidly obtain desired resources, no control over how your practice runs, inability to operative when you want and where you want, inability to hire a medical scribe (huge convenience in private practice world, the orthopaedic surgeon I work for sees about 120-140 patients a week and because of me he does zero documentation except once a week for 10 minutes to sign charts, imagine how nice that is)
5) Location is also a con as it means you are moving every 2 years if you are single and every 3 years if you have a family
6) Chain of command: there have been a lot of stories out there of nurses running clinics which means you are under the control of a nurse, this does not sit well with some folks
7) Deployments mean anywhere to a boat in the middle of the ocean taking sick call to being in the next battle of Fallujah or even taking sick call in the middle of some god forsaken desert
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care

I am sure I can come up with more negative of Navy medicine but it pretty much comes down to if you want to be a Navy military officer more than you want to be a medical doctor and do not mind the nonsense of the military, this is the place for you.

I just thought I would share my thoughts.

Good luck to everyone in their application cycles!
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That's one way of trying to get the waitlist in lol
 
premed1000 said:
Congratulations on your acceptance. Hoping to see some Navy wait list movement soon, currently on primary wait list. Currently accepted at an outside medical school but hoping to go here.

For all of those currently accepted to the Navy, remember there is really only one or two pros and quite a few cons to Navy medicine:

PROS/CONS NAVY MEDICINE

PRO:
1) Privilege to serve some of the greatest people in the world in all types of deployment settings
2) Location
3) GMO (in my opinion)

CONS:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
4) Military bureaucracy including inability to hire and fire staff, inability to rapidly obtain desired resources, no control over how your practice runs, inability to operative when you want and where you want, inability to hire a medical scribe (huge convenience in private practice world, the orthopaedic surgeon I work for sees about 120-140 patients a week and because of me he does zero documentation except once a week for 10 minutes to sign charts, imagine how nice that is)
5) Location is also a con as it means you are moving every 2 years if you are single and every 3 years if you have a family
6) Chain of command: there have been a lot of stories out there of nurses running clinics which means you are under the control of a nurse, this does not sit well with some folks
7) Deployments mean anywhere to a boat in the middle of the ocean taking sick call to being in the next battle of Fallujah or even taking sick call in the middle of some god forsaken desert
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care

I am sure I can come up with more negative of Navy medicine but it pretty much comes down to if you want to be a Navy military officer more than you want to be a medical doctor and do not mind the nonsense of the military, this is the place for you.

I just thought I would share my thoughts.

Good luck to everyone in their application cycles!
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You outright contradict two out of three "pros" in your "cons" section. So, 1000, why did you apply?
 
premed1000 said:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
Click to expand...

Yes there is a ton of paperwork and administration. This is just bureaucracy and the military is the epitome of it. However, there is a ton of paperwork in medicine in general.

Also, the "you're a military officer before you're a medical doctor" line does not sit well with me. I am going to quote another SDN Navy veteran who put it much more eloquently than I can about the moral and ethical implications of such a statement: (emphasis is mine)

"This idea far worse than the other meaningless platitudes repeated by those who lack the critical thinking ability to understand the ethical complexities of being both a physician and a military officer.

If he is a "military officer first", it absolves the physician of any ethical responsibility for following orders. That's how we get military doctors doing bad things. These "military officers first" have betrayed their medical training by working in CIA secret prisons supporting torture, force-feeding patients in GTMO prior to malnutrition in accordance with instruction but violation of worldwide medical ethical standards and generally working against the interests of individual patients so they look good to their superiors.

Officer first is fundamentally a cowardly view of the role of the military physician. You are not one thing and then the other. You are both at all times. Each choice you make has to balance that and you are the arbiter of that balance in each of those individual moments. More fundamentally, if you are a military officer first and a physician second, you aren't really a physician."
- @Gastrapathy

premed1000 said:
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
Click to expand...

Ah...no. The payback schedule is long but the math is flawed.

You incur a 7 year payback by going to USUHS. Residency TECHNICALLY adds payback time but the obligation from USUHS and residency are being paid off concurrently when you actually go into pay back years. In the majority of cases what ends up happening is that residency really does not add anything to one's obligation, unless you do neurosurgery or something ridiculously long. EDIT: Another way to think about it, after residency is completed which is the longer obligation, from school or from residency? The answer to that question is the number of years you have to pay back.

I'll do an example timeline for say family medicine.

4 years USUHS -> 1 year Intern (obligation neutral, 7 USUHS years payback) -> 3 year GMO (4 USUHS years payback) -> 2 year finish up family medicine residency (4 USUHS years payback, 2 years residency payback) -> 2 year utilization tour as an attending (2 USUHS years payback, 0 years residency payback) -> 2 year tour (Obligation done)

Total Time in Service: ~14 years (10 years as a practicing physician)

Hmmm...I suppose our end numbers are basically the same thing but your wording of residency literally adding time to obligation will not affect the bulk majority of students. For more details of obligations and payback visit the mil med forum and use the search bar.

premed1000 said:
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
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Eh...50% of new Navy medical graduates being sent off to GMOs is not everyone, so not really a "required" thing. Though I do agree with you on viewing GMOs as a positive experience. Plus the current trend is more and more competitive specialties are just training straight through so be a good medical student and you can avoid GMO.

premed1000 said:
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
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Uh...where are you getting this? To date I have heard from word of mouth that maybe 1 USUHS alumni died during duty out of the 4000-5000 graduates this school had? Even then I could not substantiate that number.

premed1000 said:
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
Click to expand...

Military residencies are good. They will not be Mass General or Mayo level, but they are good. The acuity, depending on where one is stationed after residency, can get pretty bad. That part I can agree with. Conversely, there is a silver lining of doing a GMO prior to residency since you pay your dues first and then settle into your specialty later.

Also, I have not heard veterans having trouble finding jobs after leaving the service personally or through the rants on SDN milmed.

premed1000 said:
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
Click to expand...

In general, I agree with this statement, please don't join for the money. However, the take home pay of $4500/month plus vision, dental, health is nice while one is in medical school. I am literally making more money than the bulk if not all civilian residents out there right now. It is one of those take some reward now and less in the future versus suffer now (and I really do mean suffer) and major windfall (maybe) 8-10 years later.

Plus not everyone becomes a sexy hand brain heart spine butt eye surgeon that can make $1 million/year. Almost half of medical graduates end up in a primary care field and going to USUHS and winding up in primary care is a very sound financial move especially considering military primary care physicians makes the same if not more than their civilian counterparts plus no tuition debt.

premed1000 said:
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
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You got the general idea but the specific numbers are wrong. Thanks to an act of Congress, the time spent in USUHS is not credited towards military retirement. For those not familiar, upon serving 20 years in the military you will receive a pension for life.

However, upon hitting 20 years of service following USUHS graduation, the 4 years will then be added on to the 20 years so you will receive 24 years worth of pension pay after separating from service.

premed1000 said:
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
Click to expand...

Wrong, very very wrong. I was in the hospital talking to patients around week 2 of my MS1 year and training with simulated patients throughout my time. Granted I could not really DO anything with the patients but the exposure is definitely there.

There exists a system in place where you do not have to move every 5-10 weeks called homesteading where you basically stay in the same rotation hospital for about 3 months then rotate somewhere else, or stay. Really, but also kind of depends on location. For example, you pretty much won't be homesteading in Hawaii...but Dayton, OH? Sure. No one is really forcing you to move around ever 2 months. Plus this system really is in place for the first year of clerkships, after that it becomes one's own schedule.

The CON of having a spouse with a career is real but this is a con with the military in general. USUHS actually helps spouses get jobs and there is a really robust and well run Spouse's Club at USUHS that is very supportive and helpful for families.

premed1000 said:
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care
Click to expand...

Sure...but I can argue that program directors in civilian residencies pretty much do the exact same thing because how else are you going to distinguish two candidates with a 260 Step 1 score and AOA honors? I talked with program directors in the Navy and they are given the power to assign points to boost your application and let you match if they like you. However, there is also the need to balance for the folks coming back from GMO tours and have paid their dues. Justice is the name of the game here.

For all other readers out there, just be the best medical student you can and see where the opportunities will take you as the years go on.
 
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premed1000 said:
Congratulations on your acceptance. Hoping to see some Navy wait list movement soon, currently on primary wait list. Currently accepted at an outside medical school but hoping to go here.

For all of those currently accepted to the Navy, remember there is really only one or two pros and quite a few cons to Navy medicine:

PROS/CONS NAVY MEDICINE

PRO:
1) Privilege to serve some of the greatest people in the world in all types of deployment settings
2) Location
3) GMO (in my opinion)

CONS:
1) Your a military officer before your a medical doctor which means officer duties, paper works, and from phone calls with current military doctors as you move up the chain of command the more paper work and administrative work you will be expected to perform even if you are a surgeon, more experience does not mean more surgery
2) Long payback schedule: 4 years medical school, 1 year internship, 3 year essentially required GMO (Navy docs I spoke with reported if you go to USU, you will do GMO), 3-5 year residence with or without fellowship if available, your residency adds on extra years to pay back so if you do 5 year residency you still owe 5 more years not 4 although you already paid back 3 with GMO = 15 - 19 year minimum commitment to military medicine with only time out of school counting towards retirement
3) Required GMO which means deployment and cook book medicine clearing people for deployment and flying with large amount of administrative work and required 50% fleet work: this is generally down as a general medical officer (essentially primary care), flight surgeon (primary care for pilots), or dive medical officer (primary care for aquatic related combat)
4) Military bureaucracy including inability to hire and fire staff, inability to rapidly obtain desired resources, no control over how your practice runs, inability to operative when you want and where you want, inability to hire a medical scribe (huge convenience in private practice world, the orthopaedic surgeon I work for sees about 120-140 patients a week and because of me he does zero documentation except once a week for 10 minutes to sign charts, imagine how nice that is)
5) Location is also a con as it means you are moving every 2 years if you are single and every 3 years if you have a family
6) Chain of command: there have been a lot of stories out there of nurses running clinics which means you are under the control of a nurse, this does not sit well with some folks
7) Deployments mean anywhere to a boat in the middle of the ocean taking sick call to being in the next battle of Fallujah or even taking sick call in the middle of some god forsaken desert
8) Dying - the odds of this are no worse than driving on a snowy road but this is not to day that doctors do not die while on employment, to date a few doctors have died in the middle east and a few even died in Desert Storm which was a pretty one sided war
9) Skill atrophy is mentioned here and there. For one, you definitely will not get the exposure to that of a competitive civilian residency and some of the GMO work is pretty monotonous. You are also limiting you breadth of practice with generally healthy men and their family members if you have aspirations of leaving the military following our required pay back
10) Pay - a lot of people try and argue that in the long term it equals out but this is simply not true. One if you are in it for the money this definitely is not the place. Even with Obama Care you can still make a killing in what some call "lucrative" private practice with some surgeons easily making 500K a year. Your not going to make than 150K in the military even if you are a top notch surgeon.
11) Retirement - your 4 years of school do not count towards retirement but once you hit "24" years after you start school you will be credited with your 4 years in school towards your total retirement if it still exists in 24 years
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship. You will also be moving every 5-10 weeks during your 2.5 years of internship across the country, pro to some and major con to those with family or spouse who has a career
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities. For example, resident applicants are ranked on a score with 30 being the maximum. If you do not complete a GMO tour the maximum amount of points you can achieve is 13 while the same applicant who completed a GMO can obtain a maximum score of 20. If you go above that, that means you are a current resident applying for another residency or something of that nature. Essentially, if you have not completed a GMO, you will be doing primary care

I am sure I can come up with more negative of Navy medicine but it pretty much comes down to if you want to be a Navy military officer more than you want to be a medical doctor and do not mind the nonsense of the military, this is the place for you.

I just thought I would share my thoughts.

Good luck to everyone in their application cycles!
Click to expand...


You're OR You are, NOT Your.
 
RLA pretty much hit the nail on the head here.With regard to 12, and 13:
premed1000 said:
12) The curriculum at USU is like many others except it does not target early clinical exposure until you start clerkship.
Click to expand...
The first block in the pre-clerkship period includes a physical exam and medical interviewing courses. You will go to the hospital and interview patients. You will rotate through other clinics such as cardiology and dermatology and examine patients with real finding. The training is limited, but appropriate for a beginning medical student. Also the student interest groups provide opportunities to get more clinical exposure to specialties. I know OB/GYN offered students a chance to go to the labor deck and even deliver a baby. Surgery had opportunities to shadow.
premed1000 said:
13) Residency is not always merit base, it is also based on your military experience and leadership qualities.
Click to expand...
The GME selection process is subject to the FOIA so the points system is there somewhat to justify why some applicants were selected over others. Transition year interns and GMO's are also selected from a different pool of applicants that 4th year medical students so you will be compared against your peers for residency.The selection process itself varies widely among specialties and services too.

In terms of Navy GME, a GMO tour is a negative if you want continuous training, but advantageous should you not get picked for a more competitive specialty as a 4th year because of the increased availability of spots for GMOs.
 
Hello everyone!!! First time posting after catching up with all your stories. First of all congratulations on any acceptances, positions in the waitlist, and even on just having completed all the application requirements (it takes a lot!)

I was curious to know if there is anyone here that interviewed on December 3rd? I did and I'm very excited to see the outcome of so much hard work. Good luck to everyone still in the running!
 
Unexciting said:
Well it's a new week and a new year, the holidays are over (I hope everyone had a good break from med school anxiety) and everyone is back to work, does that mean the adcoms are back in session? Should we resume our stressful phone/mailbox watching? Anyone care to speculate?
Click to expand...


Well, I have been pretty relaxed until this past week started. Anxiety is exponentially increasing since Im sure something is bound to happen any day now. I think the admissions office will begin working at a fast rate since everything tends to slow down during holiday season.

I interviewed on December 3rd. I felt both of my interviews were excellent, so hopes are up even though Im aware of the class being "full" by this point. I only applied to USUHS which makes this whole process triple the stressful!!!
 
Does anyone know if interview decisions for 11/12 already went out?
 
Teioh said:
Does anyone know if interview decisions for 11/12 already went out?
Click to expand...
Somebody who interviewed on 11/12 received an acceptance a few days ago. Someone else who interviewed that day received an acceptance right before winter break. You should probably hear something very soon. I interviewed 11/19, and I haven't heard anything yet. But I'm hoping for something this week, or the next one.
 
soadhead said:
Somebody who interviewed on 11/12 received an acceptance a few days ago. Someone else who interviewed that day received an acceptance right before winter break. You should probably hear something very soon. I interviewed 11/19, and I haven't heard anything yet. But I'm hoping for something this week, or the next one.
Click to expand...



Ahh, good luck! The wait is tedious . There are moments when I genuinely want to call them to touch base and let them know my interest is still strong, but then again they clearly stated not to call to ask for updates after interviewing so yeah. I dont want to bother or to act like I cant follow a simple instruction haha. Holidays just ended a week ago so, im hopeful for the upcoming weeks. All the luck to you!!!!
 
I interviewed on 11/5 and am still waiting to hear...
 
Very late notice but rejected pre-II, had a second look and offered a shot for the EDMP2 program but since I am leaving active duty I don't think this is feasible.
 
Marine2MD said:
Very late notice but rejected pre-II, had a second look and offered a shot for the EDMP2 program but since I am leaving active duty I don't think this is feasible.
Click to expand...
Have you looked into HPSP? Still a ton of spots available for this year.


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I have, I got a few individual notices from personnel associated with Navy and Army HPSP but none have returned my calls or emails since. I was stoked when I first got the emails and voicemails since they received my information directly from USUHS and one from LTC Saguil but it is becoming frustrating now. Either way, not sure if I will be competitive due to my MCAT score, it is the only reason that they could not offer me an II, at least that is what they told me on the phone each time they called me. Will likely retake the MCAT and reapply next year if I do not get into a different MD school this year.
 
Rejected pre-II this morning... In the paperwork process for HPSP though
 
Marine2MD said:
I have, I got a few individual notices from personnel associated with Navy and Army HPSP but none have returned my calls or emails since. I was stoked when I first got the emails and voicemails since they received my information directly from USUHS and one from LTC Saguil but it is becoming frustrating now. Either way, not sure if I will be competitive due to my MCAT score, it is the only reason that they could not offer me an II, at least that is what they told me on the phone each time they called me. Will likely retake the MCAT and reapply next year if I do not get into a different MD school this year.
Click to expand...
If you end up waiting till next year, also consider HSCP. I can explain the differences. It's already closed for this year though. It's the program I was going to do as a backup to USUHS


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
Good luck @CosmicGenes ! I'm in a similar boat to you, USUHS is the only school I applied to this season. It hurt a bit when I was put on hold status but I'm still hopeful that can change!
 
Unexciting said:
Good luck @CosmicGenes ! I'm in a similar boat to you, USUHS is the only school I applied to this season. It hurt a bit when I was put on hold status but I'm still hopeful that can change!
Click to expand...


Ahh! So nice to see Im not the only crazy person to apply to just one school hehehe. I just feel it's the perfect program for me and I will just work hard to earn my place in it, even if it means waiting a little longer. Its been 6 weeks since my interview date. I had an excellent time while I visited and I felt both my interviews went great, so hopes are up! This acceptance is one that would absolutely change my life and it would definitely be a personal accomplishment. I have talked to several students of previous classes and several physicians that graduated from USUHS and they all mention there is always movement in both acceptances and pulls from the waiting lists around this time of the cycle... so HOPES are UP! Did you get to interview? Because there are still a few interview groups left... I will cross my fingers for you! All my good vibes!!!
 
I was considering HPCP as well but wanted more detail on it since the pamphlet the USN LT sent me wasn't very clear. Could you send me some info on it or where I can get some more detailed information? I think it mentioned something along the lines of being an active duty PO1/Officer Candidate while going to school and receiving full pay/benefits but that was all that it had.
 
Unexciting said:
Good luck @CosmicGenes ! I'm in a similar boat to you, USUHS is the only school I applied to this season. It hurt a bit when I was put on hold status but I'm still hopeful that can change!
Click to expand...
CosmicGenes said:
Ahh! So nice to see Im not the only crazy person to apply to just one school hehehe. I just feel it's the perfect program for me and I will just work hard to earn my place in it, even if it means waiting a little longer. Its been 6 weeks since my interview date. I had an excellent time while I visited and I felt both my interviews went great, so hopes are up! This acceptance is one that would absolutely change my life and it would definitely be a personal accomplishment. I have talked to several students of previous classes and several physicians that graduated from USUHS and they all mention there is always movement in both acceptances and pulls from the waiting lists around this time of the cycle... so HOPES are UP! Did you get to interview? Because there are still a few interview groups left... I will cross my fingers for you! All my good vibes!!!
Click to expand...
I did the same last year and applied only to USUHS. I interviewed in October and was waitlisted but never accepted. I hope it works better for both of you.


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Glycereine said:
I did the same last year and applied only to USUHS. I interviewed in October and was waitlisted but never accepted. I hope it works better for both of you.


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Click to expand...


Thank you!!!!!! I sure hope it works out!!! Did you get in this cycle? If so congratulations!!
 
Unexciting said:
I'm in a similar boat to you, USUHS is the only school I applied to this season.
Click to expand...

CosmicGenes said:
Ahh! So nice to see Im not the only crazy person to apply to just one school hehehe.
Click to expand...

Glycereine said:
I did the same last year and applied only to USUHS.
Click to expand...

+1

In hindsight, it was probably a mistake limiting my choices as such but I was feeling pretty confident about the competitiveness of my application specifically for USUHS. Clearly I have chosen poorly. If I end up in another application season, I won't be making the same mistake twice.
 
CosmicGenes said:
Thank you!!!!!! I sure hope it works out!!! Did you get in this cycle? If so congratulations!!
Click to expand...
I didn't. I was accepted elsewhere this cycle though. I didn't even get an interview invite for USUHS this time around and ironically everything about my application improved.
ThirtySixAlpha said:
+1

In hindsight, it was probably a mistake limiting my choices as such but I was feeling pretty confident about the competitiveness of my application specifically for USUHS. Clearly I have chosen poorly. If I end up in another application season, I won't be making the same mistake twice.
Click to expand...
I felt my competitiveness was really good as well and when I reapplied this year I expected to get an interview again since my GPA had increased and I had more ECs. I think I may have suffered by not taking the new MCAT even though I was told it wouldn't matter (33 on the old one).


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
 
@Glycereine It may have been the new MCAT. I didn't get near the score I wanted and was told directly that my MCAT score was the issue in conjunction with the large amount of applicants they had received. They were trying to find a way to evaluate the new MCAT score and at the beginning of June the thought was anything north of 500 was interview worthy. Not sure what happened.
 
ThirtySixAlpha said:
+1

In hindsight, it was probably a mistake limiting my choices as such but I was feeling pretty confident about the competitiveness of my application specifically for USUHS. Clearly I have chosen poorly. If I end up in another application season, I won't be making the same mistake twice.
Click to expand...


I understand. I hope it all turns out for the best!
 
Marine2MD said:
@Glycereine It may have been the new MCAT. I didn't get near the score I wanted and was told directly that my MCAT score was the issue in conjunction with the large amount of applicants they had received. They were trying to find a way to evaluate the new MCAT score and at the beginning of June the thought was anything north of 500 was interview worthy. Not sure what happened.
Click to expand...

Wow, that is something. I wonder what happened. Either way...Congratulations on your 33 MCAT! and Congratulations on your acceptance to another school! Your hard work paid off!
 
Glycereine said:
I felt my competitiveness was really good as well and when I reapplied this year I expected to get an interview again since my GPA had increased and I had more ECs. I think I may have suffered by not taking the new MCAT even though I was told it wouldn't matter (33 on the old one).
Click to expand...

It's a really bizarre outcome, and definitely makes the lack of transparency in the entire process aggravating.
 
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