UCBShocker said:
I am sure alot of you have heard of Luke Ballard and his HPSP essay. He says that in a lot of cases the reserve duty incurred for HPSP can be served during medical school. Is this true? I had always assumed that you had 4 years medical school, 4 years residency, 4 years active duty, and then 4 years reserve. Thanks for your help.
Mmmmmmmmmmm . . . depends.
Everyone, regardless of how long they may think they are in for, owes this "8 year committment." So, you can look at it this way:
4 years med school: doesn't count for payback time, but you incur a 4 year obligation
4 years internship/residency: if you do it in the military, you owe 4 years for the training, but since you're on active duty simultaneously, you can look at it as a wash.
4 years post-residency active duty: think of it as paying back your med school.
4 years reserve: only if your active duty TOTAL (i.e., military residency PLUS active duty) is less than 8 years, you owe the balance to the IRR.
So, lets say you do HPSP for med school: you owe the army 4 years.
Then you do a civilian residency: you incur no obligation, but neither do you pay anything back.
Then you go on active duty for 4 years. You've payed back med school, you owe nothing for residency, but you still owe 8-4=4 years of IRR reserve time.
On the other hand, if you do HPSP and a military residency of 4 years, and then 4 years as a staff MD, you have done 8 years of active duty (residency + payback) and owe no more reserve time.
NOTHING is "served" or "payed back" during medical school.
I won't even pretend to know how this may change if you go to USUHS.
Hope that doesn't confuse things even more.
RMD 1-8-12
