Questions about USUHS - Army

[Dr. Mayhem]

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Hey everyone,

I just had a few questions about USUHS. 1) I have a good idea about the matching process and from what I've heard, the army has a lot of positions open for primary care. Is this correct? Just to know my chances of actually matching into family medicine. 2) When you're a student, I know you can live on your own, but like how does "the AWOL policy" work:? Sorry not familiar with the military terms yet lol. Is there an attendance list or something?. 3) I know you do officer training before you go to the school, but do you start getting paid during that time or does it start when you actually start going to school?.

Any help with this would be greatly appreciated.

 

[BC_89]

Moving to military medicine.

 

[HighPriest]

If you're training for the Army, you're getting paid.

Of all of the things you can match in to, primary care (especially family med) is probably the most likely. All of that being said, two things:
1 - read the military medicine thread inside and out. There are a lot of changes on the horizon. No one knows what the end results of those changes will be, or how it will effect matching or physician numbers, or anything else. I don't think it will really effect family med all that much, but I have no idea. Anyone who tells you they know how it's going to shake out is lying.
2 - Keep in mind that every medical student knows what kind of medicine they want to practice right up until they don't want to practice that kind of medicine anymore. Every year we get a deluge of students who are "absolutely sure" they want to do "X." Everyone tells them the same thing: don't count your eggs before they hatch. You may (and probably will) change your mind. If you don't: great! But if you do, you want to make sure you aren't prematurely burning any bridges because you were sure 4 years ago you wanted to do family med.

 

[SirGecko]

To answer your second question, you are an active duty officer when at USUHS. Basically this means you have to put in leave whenever you are going to be out of the area or miss work. They had a sign in must three days a week when I was at USUHS but the specifics of that could have changed.

 

[Dr. Mayhem]

If you're training for the Army, you're getting paid.

Of all of the things you can match in to, primary care (especially family med) is probably the most likely. All of that being said, two things:
1 - read the military medicine thread inside and out. There are a lot of changes on the horizon. No one knows what the end results of those changes will be, or how it will effect matching or physician numbers, or anything else. I don't think it will really effect family med all that much, but I have no idea. Anyone who tells you they know how it's going to shake out is lying.
2 - Keep in mind that every medical student knows what kind of medicine they want to practice right up until they don't want to practice that kind of medicine anymore. Every year we get a deluge of students who are "absolutely sure" they want to do "X." Everyone tells them the same thing: don't count your eggs before they hatch. You may (and probably will) change your mind. If you don't: great! But if you do, you want to make sure you aren't prematurely burning any bridges because you were sure 4 years ago you wanted to do family med.

Thank you, that really helps 🙂

 

[Dr. Mayhem]

To answer your second question, you are an active duty officer when at USUHS. Basically this means you have to put in leave whenever you are going to be out of the area or miss work. They had a sign in must three days a week when I was at USUHS but the specifics of that could have changed.

Thank you, I've been thinking about this a lot.