WAY, way back when, when my husband (and I) were deciding whether or not to pursue HPSP, (1993, to be exact) my father-in-law put us in touch with a guy who had done HPSP, completed his residency, and was about to complete some kind of fellowship. His first advice to my husband was "don't do it", which we obviously ignored.
The next thing he said was "go Air Force if you decide on HPSP and can get an Air Force slot". My husband took that advice and has never been sorry about the branch he chose. Our eyes have been opened to a lot of things during the eight years of active duty time DH has spent in the military, and we would do a lot of things differently if we were doing it all over, (namely, we WOULDN'T do it) but DH has said many times how thankful he is that he is not Army.....during residency, when he was in a combined program with Army residents, and also now, especially since 9/11.
There is still plenty of bureaucracy, like you will find in any branch of service, but perhaps because the Air Force is smaller, it is much less than you will find in the Army. As far as deployments go....it is anybody's guess in today's military, but every single person DH (his year and ahead of him) knew from residency who is Army has been deployed during their staff years, in a specialty that is not one that comes immediately to mind when you think of combat medicine. None of his Air Force classmates have deployed. If you are the kind of person who looks forward to the military aspects of being a physician in the armed forces and hopes to deploy, then God bless you and please don't be offended......but when DH signed up, the world seemed like a pretty safe place and deployment in wartime wasn't even on our radar screen.....maybe we were stupid, but we weren't the only ones.
Lifestyle depends on your assignment.....there is not much else I can say about that, but DH's lifestyle hasn't been too horrible during his four years at a mid-sized base. The quality of people that he has had to work with has been by far the largest issue, and I am talking physicians as well as ancillary staff. Remember that you will have NO control over this, and very little authority, either, particularly if most of the employees are contract staff and not active duty, as is the case in my husband's clinic.
PM me if you have specific questions.
Sally
