National Guard, etc.

[Ewalk00]

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We just had some National Guard recruiters on our campus...They were talking a "good game", but I was wondering if there was anyone out there that is a med. student in the Guard. Is it any good? What do they really pay for? Can you still get deployed?

I was also wondering if there was any benefit in joining the Air Force Reserves? Do they have any incentives for medical students?

Basically, I am looking to get the most out of the military by doing the least amount in return.

 

[River6]

Don't bother joining. People of your ilk are not needed.

 

[MaximusD]

Don't bother joining. People of your ilk are not needed.

ilk... LOL are you serious?

I do agree though. You have no place in teh military.

 

[notdeadyet]

Basically, I am looking to get the most out of the military by doing the least amount in return.

Talk to folks currently in the military. It's usually the other way around...

 

[River6]

ilk... LOL are you serious?

I do agree though. You have no place in teh military.

Yes I'm serious. I have seen to many people in my time in the military (15 years so far-active and reserve) with this attitude. They usually don't last long, or they go on forums like this and complain about military medicine.

There is nowhere in the medical field where you can get a lot and not put out anything. I really don't know how people like the OP make it through medical school. As the old saying goes, "What do you call the person who graduates last in medical school? Doctor."

When you are sawing off a kid's leg or handing him off to the chaplain for Last Rites, you'll know why I think of the OP as ‘ilk'.

 

[Ewalk00]

River6, you obviously missed the point of the post. What can the military do for me? Obviously medicine requires a lot out of you, I wouldn't be in medical school if I didn't already know this. Second of all I am mostly interested in the incentives to join and less interested in your personal beef with people that don't like military medicine.

 

[River6]

River6, you obviously missed the point of the post. What can the military do for me? Obviously medicine requires a lot out of you, I wouldn't be in medical school if I didn't already know this. Second of all I am mostly interested in the incentives to join and less interested in your personal beef with people that don't like military medicine.

I think this quote from you sums up what you are looking for,

"Basically, I am looking to get the most out of the military by doing the least amount in return."

You want an incentive to join, here it is: SERVING YOUR COUNTRY. If you are looking for it as a JUST way to pay for medical school, do something else.

The question should not be what the military can do for you. It should be what you can do for the military. That is where you have the wrong attitude.

If you want to serve your country and be a physician than go for it. IMHO you will meet the best people this country can produce. You will get a chance to go to different places. You will have a chance to be at the frontier of medicine with all the new technologies being created in battlefield medicine. You will get a chance to see and do more than most civilian physicians do in their career.

As far as Soldiers go, you are dealing with people who are generally proactive about their health (whether by choice or by job security). That is a nice change from dealing with patients who for years of neglect wreck their bodies with mostly preventable diseases like Type II diabetes, heart diseases, and some cancers, and blame you for not helping them more.

And if or when you go back to the civilian world of medicine, you will be a better Doctor.

Don't get so defensive, take my words as I am giving them, advice from someone who has been there and done that. Look at what you want out of your life. Don't get into military medicine just because of the benefits of having school paid for.

And just like anyhwere else, there is also a lot of idiots and bullsh**t that goes on. It depends where you are stationed. But eventually if you stay in you will be the one who can fix things.

Good luck

 

[mitchconnie]

You want an incentive to join, here it is: SERVING YOUR COUNTRY. If you are looking for it as a JUST way to pay for medical school, do something else.

The question should not be what the military can do for you. It should be what you can do for the military. That is where you have the wrong attitude.

If you want to serve your country and be a physician than go for it. IMHO you will meet the best people this country can produce. You will get a chance to go to different places. You will have a chance to be at the frontier of medicine with all the new technologies being created in battlefield medicine. You will get a chance to see and do more than most civilian physicians do in their career.

I agree with your overall point that joining for money is a bad idea, but give the OP some credit. How many physicians would sign up for the military if there were no HPSP or USUHS scholarship? Only a small minority of physicians are so blindly patriotic that they would volunteer with no monetary incentive whatsoever.

And maybe you could back down the military cheerleading a notch. For instance, please let me know where I can go for my next (third) deployment and be on the "frontier of medicine with all the new technologies." I did a boatload of combat surgery at the busiest hospital in Iraq and didn't see anything that looked remotely like the "frontier of medicine." I couldn't even get basic surgical equipment that has been available in the US for a decade. Seriously, what are you referring to?

And "see and do more than most physicians do in their career"? Yeah...I've washed out more blast wounds than anyone and am probably the only subspecialty surgeon on the planet that regularly sees colds, sprained ankles, and STD's. What's so interesting about that? My case load in my subspecialty is 1/3 to 1/2 of my civilian counterparts.

I also agree that the military offers some unique locales and experiences, but as an attending, you need to be little more nuanced with your posts or you'll come off sounding like a recruiter.

 

[River6]

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