Lost 4th year med student

[Bad Moose]

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I applied to DO Anesthesia and did not match. I have average board scores (491) and did not take the USMLE. I haven't heard anything from any MD programs. I have scrambled into a DO TRI which I have not signed yet because of the remote chance of the MD scramble having something. Here is my plea of help.

I am interested in the Military. I am partial to the Navy but have heard that they do not have the HPLRP anymore for doctors and have a smaller GME department than the Army. I was thinking about just becoming a flight surgeon to give me some time to reconsider specialities (if I am brave enough for surgery) and rack up points with the board so that one day I could join any speciality I wanted (within reason).

Long story short. I was planing on taking USMLE 1 and joining the Navy. Is the Army a better financial deal than the Navy?

 

[Bad Moose]

I applied to DO Anesthesia and did not match. I have average board scores (491) and did not take the USMLE. I haven't heard anything from any MD programs. I have scrambled into a DO TRI which I have not signed yet because of the remote chance of the MD scramble having something. Here is my plea of help.

I am interested in the Military. I am partial to the Navy but have heard that they do not have the HPLRP anymore for doctors and have a smaller GME department than the Army. I was thinking about just becoming a flight surgeon to give me some time to reconsider specialities (if I am brave enough for surgery) and rack up points with the board so that one day I could join any speciality I wanted (within reason).

Long story short. I was planing on taking USMLE 1 and joining the Navy. Is the Army a better financial deal than the Navy?

bump

 

[bulldogmed]

I applied to DO Anesthesia and did not match. I have average board scores (491) and did not take the USMLE. I haven't heard anything from any MD programs. I have scrambled into a DO TRI which I have not signed yet because of the remote chance of the MD scramble having something. Here is my plea of help.

I am interested in the Military. I am partial to the Navy but have heard that they do not have the HPLRP anymore for doctors and have a smaller GME department than the Army. I was thinking about just becoming a flight surgeon to give me some time to reconsider specialities (if I am brave enough for surgery) and rack up points with the board so that one day I could join any speciality I wanted (within reason).

Long story short. I was planing on taking USMLE 1 and joining the Navy. Is the Army a better financial deal than the Navy?

Based on my limited understanding (M2, Navy HPSP) from reading this forum, you don't need to take the USMLE boards if you've already taken the COMLEX to apply for a military residency. The Army is the same deal financially as the Navy. The difference is the size and number of spots and the geographical locations.

As to the other parts of your post, I don't have enough information for that, and I'll leave to others more knowledgeable than myself.

 

[pgg]

bump

You don't need to bump your own thread 90 minutes after you post it.


There may be some $ differences between services when it comes to direct accession bonuses, based on each service's perceived need for a specialty at any given time. But regardless I don't think there have ever been signup bonuses for physician graduates who haven't done a residency. I could be wrong.

It's February, the military match for PGY-1 positions was in December, with all application materials due a couple months before that. I'm not sure that it's even possible for you to join now and scramble into a military internship in any branch (I doubt it). The usual entry mechanisms for people who didn't come in via military sponsorship of their medical education are FAP (which requires being in a civilian residency) or direct accession (which requires completion of a civilian residency).


I don't mean to be discouraging. Well, maybe I do. We in the military don't like the idea of our community being a "fall back" option for physicians who couldn't find a spot to get training in the civilian world. We don't want to recruit from that pool. Every spring a couple people post here with similar stories - unable to match into a residency, or worse yet, dismissed from residency, looking for a way to step into the military and get another shot at it while their loans are paid off for them.

They're looking to join the military for the wrong reasons, they'll be miserable, they'll make us miserable, and they have very high odds of being marginal or lousy doctors, which will make us even more miserable when we have to pick up their slack.

Do the internship you scrambled into (congrats ... it's a job and a path forward, even if it's not your first choice), finish a residency, and prove to the world that your sub-averageness so far is an anomoly and that you're not really a sub-average doctor. And then think about joining the military if you want to be in the military. The Navy will still be here later.

 

[omn]

You don't need to bump your own thread 90 minutes after you post it.


There may be some $ differences between services when it comes to direct accession bonuses, based on each service's perceived need for a specialty at any given time. But regardless I don't think there have ever been signup bonuses for physician graduates who haven't done a residency. I could be wrong.

It's February, the military match for PGY-1 positions was in December, with all application materials due a couple months before that. I'm not sure that it's even possible for you to join now and scramble into a military internship in any branch (I doubt it). The usual entry mechanisms for people who didn't come in via military sponsorship of their medical education are FAP (which requires being in a civilian residency) or direct accession (which requires completion of a civilian residency).


I don't mean to be discouraging. Well, maybe I do. We in the military don't like the idea of our community being a "fall back" option for physicians who couldn't find a spot to get training in the civilian world. We don't want to recruit from that pool. Every spring a couple people post here with similar stories - unable to match into a residency, or worse yet, dismissed from residency, looking for a way to step into the military and get another shot at it while their loans are paid off for them.

They're looking to join the military for the wrong reasons, they'll be miserable, they'll make us miserable, and they have very high odds of being marginal or lousy doctors, which will make us even more miserable when we have to pick up their slack.

Do the internship you scrambled into (congrats ... it's a job and a path forward, even if it's not your first choice), finish a residency, and prove to the world that your sub-averageness so far is an anomoly and that you're not really a sub-average doctor. And then think about joining the military if you want to be in the military. The Navy will still be here later.

I think a related question.. (not that I'm lost, i'm too old ) if someone is thinking about FAP.. are there certain geographic areas where it would make sense to apply to residency? I mean, only thinking about reserve type obligations.. I guess haven't been able to find what are common reserve duties and/or how that relates to these medical programs like FAP? It seems to stand to reason that reserve duties might be different depending on whether you are at a residency in West Florida or West Virginia? Or is there something I am missing?