How do Medical Schools and Residency Programs deal with deployed reservists?

[StanMarsh1978]

A simple question with (I'm sure) complex answers:

Say you're a reservist or guardsman in a combat arms unit. Four years out of five, you do your one weekend a month/etc. But in the fourth or fifth year, you're sent to Itsubishi. You're a patriot and more than willing to go and delay the rest of your life--which is great, because you don't have a choice. You've also just completed your second or third year of medical school, or your first or second year of a residency. You are not interested in transfering your military commission to a medical command.

How do medical schools and residency programs deal with this? Are they likely to show you the door for "abandoning" them for a year? Or will they allow you to pick up where you left off when you're through with the deployment? If you don't highlight your preexisting military committment to them during the interview process, do they regard this as "misleading" them? If you note the committment up front, will this substantially impact your application in a negative way? Does this vary between programs and schools?

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[notdeadyet]

Or will they allow you to pick up where you left off when you're through with the deployment?

No comment for residency, but for medical school, this could get incredibly ugly. It's going to depend a lot on the individual school, but if there's a integrated curriculum, a one year deployment could set you back two years, depending on the timing of when you're actually deployed.

I think going to medical school with reserve obligations in which you are not depoyment-exempt is bad, bad juju.

If you don't highlight your preexisting military committment to them during the interview process, do they regard this as "misleading" them? If you note the committment up front, will this substantially impact your application in a negative way? Does this vary between programs and schools?

Curious to hear the responses to this. I'm currently National Guard but am (theoretically) exempt from deployment. I toy with the idea of telling them about my involvement and providing documentation showing that I can not be deployed until after residency, and just not saying anything at all.

If I WAS deployable during residency, I would consider it extremely dishonest and unethical to just not mention it. Treat others as you would have them treat you.

 

[ValeRx]

I could write a 10 page story about this.

 

[notdeadyet]

I could write a 10 page story about this.

Do tell.

 

[CBMD]

I would also be interested in the story. I am strongly considering the reserves for residency (I am currently AD GMO seperating this summer to do civ residency) and was told by both the recruiter (I know I know don't beleive em) and also my friends who got out in the past few years and picked up spots in the reserves that they won't touch you in residency. I also was sent a reference citing I would be non-deployable and the instruction I was sent basically said that I could count grand rounds, cme, etc for my drilling and AT and I would only have to muster twice a year to do the PFA. If anyone with actual experience in the reserves during residency has something to add, please let me know. There's also a thread from a while back talking about reserves and residency and it has some pretty good info if I recall correctly
Here is the http: http://forums.studentdoctor.net/showthread.php?t=541138

To the OP, I would strongly consider against keeping a deployable reserve affiliation during med school and residency because I beleive it will hurt your career progression in the long run. You could probably get away with it during med school, but gaps in training will always raise flags when applying for residency (if you had to deploy during med school), even though you will have a great excuse. Residency, I think would be a huge deal as they need bodies so not only would you be screwing over the program, but more importantly you'd be screwing over your fellow residents and that can get ugly. Even if you don't deploy, most programs have requirements and you REALLY won't want to spend 2 of your 3 weeks of vacation (If you even get that many) on AT and oh, yeah, no golden weekends ever for you, because you'd be drilling almost every one of them. I think the potential for burnout would be incredible and not worth the risk, but hey that's just my 2c.

 

[StanMarsh1978]

Of interest as I research this item:

http://meded-portal.ucsd.edu/webportal/announc/rlasso.html

He seems to have dealt with it pretty well. Thoughts?

 

[ValeRx]

Do tell.

Well, it's not really an answer to the question but more of my own upcoming situation. In my case it will be how does a pharmacy school deal with deployed reservists.

 

[DogFaceMedic]

You have to be given your position back right back where you were. So mob'd out of school would delay you until you got back. Mob'd out of residency you go back to where you were. The law is the Uniformed Services Employment and Re-employment Rights Act (USERRA) and has a website somewhere.

The sad reality is that there are jerks who don't believe the federal law and you have to beat them over the head -- metaphorically speaking. Jerk administrators might say that they have to be given proper notice or they can't fit you back into the program because of space. The law is perfectly clear: all you have to do is give verbal notice and send them a copy of orders, even after the fact. Secondly, if there is lack of space for you, that is the school's/residency's problem, not yours, and they have to fix it. There is no wiggle room for employers of any kind. Second reality check: try to be as accomodating as possible and most administrators will be accomodating as well and most will bend over backward to help. USERRA allows for DOD awards to go to employers.

I have fought with and legally beaten employers, private and gov't, over this issue for myself once and often for my soldiers in the past.

I don't know anyone mob'd out of residency, so do not know any examples.

 

[IgD]

Well, it's not really an answer to the question but more of my own upcoming situation. In my case it will be how does a pharmacy school deal with deployed reservists.

I don't think you have anything to worry about. I'm sure the school will treat you fairly. They might even generate a press release about your deployment. I would go talk to your dean and be honest about it. I suspect they would give you a leave of absence. You'll be back in a year right??

 

[ValeRx]

I don't think you have anything to worry about. I'm sure the school will treat you fairly. They might even generate a press release about your deployment. I would go talk to your dean and be honest about it. I suspect they would give you a leave of absence. You'll be back in a year right??

Well, it is still speculation at this point. I've yet to complete my pre-requisites to begin pharmacy school this fall. Pre-deployment training would take up the final month of spring quarter due to funding issues. This would force me to drop all of my classes, thus not completing my pre-reqs. Not completing my pre-reqs means I lose my conditional acceptance. The deployment goes until Fall 2010, so no time to complete those classes before returning home. That means I would have to wait until Fall 2011 to begin. I don't know of schools that will allow for a two year deferment.

I didn't mention it during my interview because I was set to ETS in June. Nothing was certain during my interview as it was all a 'possible deployment' at that time. Now the deployment is for sure. I may have to deploy, I may not, seeing as stop-loss is supposed to kick in around the middle of May.

 

[DogFaceMedic]

Well, it is still speculation at this point. I've yet to complete my pre-requisites to begin pharmacy school this fall. Pre-deployment training would take up the final month of spring quarter due to funding issues. This would force me to drop all of my classes, thus not completing my pre-reqs. Not completing my pre-reqs means I lose my conditional acceptance. The deployment goes until Fall 2010, so no time to complete those classes before returning home. That means I would have to wait until Fall 2011 to begin. I don't know of schools that will allow for a two year deferment.

I didn't mention it during my interview because I was set to ETS in June. Nothing was certain during my interview as it was all a 'possible deployment' at that time. Now the deployment is for sure. I may have to deploy, I may not, seeing as stop-loss is supposed to kick in around the middle of May.

If you have a conditional acceptance in hand and cannot complete pre-reqs b/c of deployment, they still must allow you to complete them on return. The conditional acceptance stays in effect, even if they say it lasts only one year, USERRA trumps it. I've helped resolve similar issues with schools and they usually are very willing to help students.

IgD is right to suggest talking to the dean.

 

[StanMarsh1978]

Outstanding answer. Thanks. No doubt that this sort of thing can be difficult. But life is an adventure.

 

[Perrotfish]

To be clear: is joining the reserves something you're thinking of doing or something you've already done? I thought you were just an AD lawyer. Should your reserve obligation be up by the time you get through the prereqs? Even if you had signed up yesterday, you should be done with reserved by your second year of med school.

Keep in mind that a medical school can't just start you up whenever you come back. You have to start up where you left off. So you need to wait until the right time of year comes up. If you deploy for 6 months, you're still waiting 12.

Also I think you should be significantly more worried about the weekend a month than you are. You don't necessarily have all your weekends free in med school (especially years 3 and 4), and you definitely don't have weekends free in residency . Keep in mind that, in residency, if you leave there's no replacement, just a hole in the call scheudle that someone else needs to fill. Maybe they will legally need to find someone to fill it, but youre going to get REAL unpopular.

Now if you're already in, you can work around these things I'm sure. Legally they have to let you. But if you're not, I doubt that this is an obligation you want to pick up.

 

[notdeadyet]

Keep in mind that, in residency, if you leave there's no replacement, just a hole in the call scheudle that someone else needs to fill. Maybe they will legally need to find someone to fill it, but youre going to get REAL unpopular.

This bears repeating. You can talk about USERRA all that you want. That's handy to make sure you'll still have a job, but doesn't prevent you from damaging your career.

I would try to avoid pi$$ing off residency program as much as possible. If you leave them in a lurch due to deployment/activation that you hadn't been clear with them about, there's big gaps in the schedule they weren't anticipating. And as Perrotfish mentions, that means either they'll need to fill your shifts or your colleagues will.

You'll get your spot back when you return, but you may have alienated your classmates, drained dry some referral possibilities and secured lukewarm LORs when you go job hunting.

I would avoid any reserve obligation that is not designed for medical students and takes into account the fact that our time is largely outside of our control. If you choose not to, weigh the risk carefully and minimize the damage by levelling with potential program directors so that they know what they're getting into when they take you.

 

[StanMarsh1978]

I'll have SOME reserve obligation once I leave active duty regardless of my choices. The extent of it will depend a bit on me.

Great points from the last few posters--these are the real world aspects of the question that are hard to get a handle on without insider insight. Thanks.

 

[DogFaceMedic]

I'll have SOME reserve obligation once I leave active duty regardless of my choices. The extent of it will depend a bit on me.

Great points from the last few posters--these are the real world aspects of the question that are hard to get a handle on without insider insight. Thanks.

Depending on your MOS and rank, there are many options that are easily compatible with grad school, including IMA or drilling as an individual, rather than with a unit. Most commanders and employers are more than willing to work with you and often bend over backwards to support you. There are unfortunately exceptions.

 

[Drhenney3]

Im a drilling FMF Navy Corpsman with an 8 year contract and I joined in Sept 06. Im on year 2 of my undergrad. Me getting deployed is a high probability. Im not in a volunteer status though.