HSCP Trepidations

[smtonic]

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I was just told I got a slot for HSCP today. A former Sgt in the Marine Corps, the HSCP appealed for retirement credits. I am intimately aware of the downside of being a cog in the green machine and yet I always took it in stride when I was infantry. I am not worried about this aspect - I lurked long enough to know my feelings were not an isolated phenomena.

I feel I have 2 main reservations that prevent me from accepting wholeheartedly.

1. My wife is finishing off dental school and due to a regional board, will not be able to easily practice in California. To me, this is a major financial disadvantage of accepting if we were stationed in San Diego, but more vitally, it seems to be a priority issue of making my interest supersede hers. (We found out this issue after I applied).

2. I am a huge fan of research, have a MS, 6 pubs (2 primary, 1 secondary in a cell journal),etc. Is it unrealistic to expect to continue that after medical school?

I know I am not a unique snowflake, but I would appreciate any thought processes that could help me working through my major hold backs.

 

[pgg]

1. I don't know what you mean by regional board or why she couldn't work in CA, but if you wanted to avoid being stationed in California, you could probably swing it. The Navy has lots non-CA bases, plus there is a growing Naval hospital for Marines at Lejeune.

2. Meaningful research is very, very hard for active duty physicians to do. Many reasons - frequent moves, funding, clinical and collateral duties, and ... it just isn't the military's mission to do much research, no matter what lip service is given to it.


I'm not an expert on it, but HSCP seems like a pretty good deal for prior service types who want to go to med school. All the usual milmed caveats apply though, covered ad nauseum on this forum, including my favorite: it's hard to predict the status of inservice GME 10+ years in advance, and you'd be committing yourself to it today by taking HSCP. Good luck, if you get a chance, let us know what you decide and why.

 

[smtonic]

1. Just a point for clarification. The boards for dentistry are not run at a national level, but at a geographical region level (specific states will accept several regions though, it is kind of a rabbit hole). To get a license to practice in California would require a second board test and 12 months of residency. But your point is taken that there are plenty of opportunities outside of California.

2. Thanks. It was difficult to get a straight answer from any of the Navy physicians I talked with during the application process.

You brought up some great points additionally that I have read before, but may have not reflected on at a deeper level. I will be sure to update you. Thanks.

 

[HaYn04]

Former FMF Corpsman here now in the HPSP. I applied last year hoping to get the HSCP but there were only two quotas (not entirely certain on this but the quota numbers were ridiculously low) which were taken by the start of the year. The HSCP would have been perfect for my situation considering I am attending a very affordable state school, my family would be able to continue to have TRICARE, and I would be able to add another 4 years to my time in. If you're not even remotely close to covering the tuition at your school with the pay of an E6, then the HPSP may be better deal. Of course you would still be assigned to someone while in school meaning that you would still be responsible for the same stuff every active duty member has to do including PRTs, random urine tests, GMTs and so forth. However, you can definitely breathe a sigh of relief that the Navy is nowhere near being like the infantry.

Essentially, I would have definitely given my left nut for the HSCP because I know my family would be taken cared of while I go to school and transitioning from active duty would not have been as drastic. The HPSP is definitely not family friendly and being active duty while going to school can go a long way in ways such as being able to get a mortgage or in my state being exempt from the annual vehicle tax. If you're unsure at this point, I'm sure there are a handful of other people waiting for the chance to be available to them with circumstances similar to mine. Good luck!

 

[smtonic]

I thought I would give you an update - I took the HSCP this morning.

HaYn04 - we are in a pretty similar situation; state school, mortgage, family obligations and I am currently paying all of this with my graduate stipend. The HSCP did make sense for a enumerable reasons, I am sorry that you didn’t get it, but thanks for giving me some prospective on the amazing opportunity it really is.

pgg - My wife and I came up with a number of ancillary plans for her professional career that we believe would at least allow her to practice dentistry, no matter the geographical context. For example, an easy way to get around California's residency requirement is for her to do a speciality. I dig research, but ultimately the major issue for me was my wife and her career outcomes. Again, thank you for your input.

 

[Perrotfish]

2. Meaningful research is very, very hard for active duty physicians to do. Many reasons - frequent moves, funding, clinical and collateral duties, and ... it just isn't the military's mission to do much research, no matter what lip service is given to it.

FWIW, I think the Navy is better than most midrange academic institutions when it comes to doing meaningful research, at least in terms of the resources they devote to it. At my MTF, at the moment, we have access to an mich wider range of journal than my medical school. The library staff will do fairly extensive literature searches, and they have a lightening fast turn around time for requested articles, neither of which my medical school supported. The command has a very cooperative dedicated statistician (my med school left attendings to find their own) and there is a dedicated clinical research nurse to help you navigate the red tape (which is awesome). The IRB is PAINFULLY slow, and much less lenient that most civilian intuitions, so higher risk human trials may not be practical, but in all other respects I don't think that the civilians have any resources that we don't.

Of course, none of that applies to GMOs or junior attendings in Guam. Large scale research isn't practical for them both because of their short duration of their assignment and the limited resources of their command. However I think residents are better supported than average, and a mid/late career military physician, especially one who is subspecialized and therefore effectively glued to a major MTF, will probably be able to do as much high quality research as he/she wants to.