USUHS/Military Medicine Questions

[JProspectiveMD]

Hello and thank you for checking out my post!

I recently got invited to an interview at USUHS and have several questions about what to expect if I decide to pursue a career with the military. My ultimate career goal has long been to work as a general surgeon with a special forces unit and I want to know what I can do and or expect during the process.

1. If I select the Army as my branch, will I have the opportunity to attend airborne school/ranger school during my time at USUHS?

2. Are there opportunities such as the ones listed in question 1 if I decide to go with the Navy?

3. Is general surgery considered a competitive specialty and will I have trouble getting it if I decide to go with the Army/Navy or am I almost guaranteed a GMO?

Ultimately, I want to be able to go through my schooling with as little delay as possible so that I can best serve as a combat surgeon for our guys on the front lines, preferably for a spec ops team. I don't have the unrealistic expectation that I'll be kicking down doors but I still want to participate in as much hoorah/ballbusting training that I can.

Thanks for any advice or comments and if you have any experiences pertaining to general surgery/Army/Navy/USUHS, I'd love to hear it!

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[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Hello and thank you for checking out my post!

I recently got invited to an interview at USUHS and have several questions about what to expect if I decide to pursue a career with the military. My ultimate career goal has long been to work as a general surgeon with a special forces unit and I want to know what I can do and or expect during the process.

Won't comment on the likelihood of this since I don't know anything about Army billeting or selection or anything. But...

1. If I select the Army as my branch, will I have the opportunity to attend airborne school/ranger school during my time at USUHS?

2. Are there opportunities such as the ones listed in question 1 if I decide to go with the Navy?

Everyone does a summer operational experience (SOE) in the summer between M1 and M2. Airborne right now is difficult as it is longer than the time we have available. But many people have gone to air assault. They are trying to work something out to get people to go to at least part of airborne to get the experience.

The "menu" from last year includes time at SOCM (the combat medic course), a Ranger experience (you will not go to ranger school and get a tab or anything, and they prefer people who are already airborne qualified for this), dive medicine, a combatives course, a bunch of flight medicine courses, an ultrasound course, some international opportunities, and a shipboard experience.

Many of the above experiences are open to students from all branches. Air Force students are required to go to AMP (first block of the flight surgeon course), but Navy and Army can typically go to any of them, though some of them are just open to certain branches. We have not gotten our menu yet, but it typically looks about the same every year.

3. Is general surgery considered a competitive specialty and will I have trouble getting it if I decide to go with the Army/Navy or am I almost guaranteed a GMO?

Apparently the Army very rarely does GMOs. If you want to avoid a GMO, the Army is the better bet. You could always get put in a battalion surgeon tour, which is essentially a GMO tour after you are already an attending that doesn't exist in the Navy, but you are way more likely to go straight through in the Army.

In the Navy, GMO tours are more common and depend on the specialty and the year. Additionally, with things changing right now, it's not really possible to say what it is going to look like in a few years. It's not likely that they will go away though.

Ultimately, I want to be able to go through my schooling with as little delay as possible so that I can best serve as a combat surgeon for our guys on the front lines, preferably for a spec ops team. I don't have the unrealistic expectation that I'll be kicking down doors but I still want to participate in as much hoorah/ballbusting training that I can.

Most military docs aren't doing that stuff, just fyi. Like I said, I don't know how common it is to get attached to an SF unit as a general surgeon in the Army, but the vast majority of Navy docs are not working with NSW/NSO. If you want to go through school and residency with as little delay as possible and you are absolutely set on being a general surgeon (or being able to absolutely pick your specialty), you should just go to med school as a civilian and join later if you're still interested. That's just my opinion, but going through the military route in school (whether USUHS or HPSP) absolutely has the potential to close doors if they decide they don't need very many of a particular specialty in a given year (or at all). That's not super likely with general surgery, but a large proportion of med students change their minds on what specialty they want to do, so you might not want to limit yourself before you even start med school.

 

[JProspectiveMD]

I apologize for getting back to you so late but thank you very much for all that information. I am prepping for my USUHS interview so I will have a lot of questions prepared for the staff as well. Thank you very much once again!

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

I apologize for getting back to you so late but thank you very much for all that information. I am prepping for my USUHS interview so I will have a lot of questions prepared for the staff as well. Thank you very much once again!

Feel free to ask any questions about the interview day too. I’ll probably see you lol.

 

[TheGoose]

Zero chance for going to Ranger school during your time at USUHS. I've heard folks going to Air Assault or Flight Surgeon course. Airborne possible, at least it used to be. No equivalent experience in the navy really - you wont be a seal. You could theoretically go to dive school and work with seals as a DMO or with marines though after med school for some "hooyah" stuff. Chances of mandatory time as a GMO/DMO/FS are historically higher in the Navy than Army (this may have changed since they are trying to go to a straight-through model)

General surgery in the military/Army is quite competitive. Like-minded people joining the military to do things like gen surg and EM for instance, making it more competitive than the civilian match at times. Playing the numbers, the odds are best with Army. And if you want to be heavy operational, on a 9-12 month dwell time : deployment cycle then you're in luck - the Army tempo of deploying general surgeons is pretty crazy and unfortunately there isn't much to keep yourself well trained for the big important trauma stuff with a healthy population at home station and not much action downrange

I'm not in the cheerleader or hater camp of military medicine. Trying to be a centrist for now recognizing the good and the bad. But make sure you are educated. Read a lot of the posts from this forum and some articles lately that point towards the problem (even if some artistic license has been taken)

https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2019-10-10/military-health-system-isnt-ready-for-battlefield-injuries

https://www.journalacs.org/article/S1072-7515(16)30034-5/abstract

https://www.usnews.com/news/health-news/articles/2019-10-28/top-army-surgeon-blasts-militarys-capability-to-handle-war-traumas?context=amp

https://www.usnews.com/news/national-news/articles/2019-10-10/surgeons-give-damaging-assessments-of-the-military-health-system

I loved my time at USUHS for what it's worth.

 

[armytrainingsir]

You aren't going to Ranger school as a medical student or physician.. It is an infantry course.
If you want to be a Ranger, commission or enlist infantry, go to Ranger school, deploy, then get out, use GI bill for Medical school, then go back into the Reserves or AD.


Better plan:
Go to a civilian medical school.
Take the Army Reserve cash during your civilian residency in General Surgery.
Do a trauma fellowship.
Get an academic job.
Deploy as much as you want with FST/GHOST teams.

 

[ArmyTiger]

You aren't going to Ranger school as a medical student or physician.. It is an infantry course.
If you want to be a Ranger, commission or enlist infantry, go to Ranger school, deploy, then get out, use GI bill for Medical school, then go back into the Reserves or AD.


Better plan:
Go to a civilian medical school.
Take the Army Reserve cash during your civilian residency in General Surgery.
Do a trauma fellowship.
Get an academic job.
Deploy as much as you want with FST/GHOST teams.

I know of a GMO whose unit sent him to Ranger School. It made no sense, but he went and completed it. So it is possible, given the proper set of circumstances.

Sent from my SM-G975U1 using Tapatalk

 

[deuist]

I've also met a doc (?internist) who went through the Q Course for special forces. He said it no longer happens. You can exercise and shoot all you want on your own time. The Army doesn't need you for kicking down doors and kidnapping terrorists.

 

[mslall]

1. I can think of no way to make a minimum 62 day course (ranger school) happen while you’re at USUHS. I know of 2 doctors (1 FM and 1 EM) who went AFTER completing residency and being assigned to the 75th as battalion surgeons. People have gone to air assault. The flight surgeons course is possible and is billed as a medical rotation, though I think it’s benefit is probably minimal if you want to do general surgery. Airborne school, I think is 3 weeks, so you MIGHT be able to logistically make it work, however USUHS would have to give you a spot or take that spot from another unit which I think would probably be unlikely, but at least much more plausible than ranger school. If you want to do army schools as a physician you’re much more likely to do them after completing residency and being assigned to your unit. I think this is probably much more likely now with the current transition to FORSCOM and physicians being assigned to line units.

2. I can’t speak to this being in the Army, away from WR since USUHS, and being over 6 years out from med school I don’t remember what my navy classmates did

3. You are absolutely much more likely to GMO in the navy, particularly if you want to do general surgery. The army almost exclusively sends its general surgery residents straight through residency, and in recent years, has sent a majority straight through fellowship, particularly if you want to do trauma/cc. All of my USUHS classmates that were navy that matched into genera surgery either are junior residents in general surgery or decided to do something else. I know one that got offered to go straight through and decided to switch to anesthesia. Conversely my army general surgery classmates went straight through and are either in fellowship now or are general surgeons.

As mentioned above general surgery, for the last few years at least, is one of the more consistently competitive specialties in the Army, somewhere between 1.25-2 applicants per spot depending on the year. A significant number of those applicants (that don’t match) go on to do GMO tours. I know of one person during my time as a resident who came back from GMO to finish his residency and one person that did a TY year after not matching ortho and was picked up to do general surgery the following year (but had to do a 2nd intern year to meet the ACGME requirements for a general surgery intern year). If you decide to branch army and are accepted to USUHS and are a competitive applicant you’ll match. It’s definitely your best bet on going straight through (which definitely factored into my decision for choosing army).

In regards to being with a JSOC unit...this is a whole different discussion and there’s an application and from my limited understanding a pretty in-depth interview/audition process. They very, very rarely (read almost never) take people directly out of training but I know 1 person that did get picked up in surgery. Again, they’ll send you to all the army schools you want once you’ve been selected. But to get selected to something like that they’re going to expect you to be an absolute expert in your skill set.

My advice, take it for what it costs (which is nothing), is go to school, be the best medical student possible, get everything you possible can out of residency and be the best surgeon possible, and then, If you still want after that 10 year period, seek out the other army training opportunities. No one needs a surgeon that can jump out of a plane if they aren’t an expert at controlling hemorrhage.

 

[mslall]

If you’ve got any questions I’d be happy to answer them based on my limited experience. Feel free to shoot me a DM.