Posted on 05/16/2015 6:34:15 AM PDT by pabianice
NORTH CHICAGO, Ill. — In four deployments as an Army combat medic to some of the most dangerous corners of Iraq and Afghanistan, Joe Carney had seen the worst of war — bullet wounds, severed limbs, shrapnel. He saved lives amid bombs and gunfire, his emergency room often a patch of dirt in the desert or a rocky mountainside. None of that mattered when he left the Army three years ago.
“I think the services should do a better job because at the end of the day, your last day in the Army, the last day in the Navy, you’re out, no one cares about you,” he said. “What I tell people who are planning to get out is, you have to have a plan.”
Like many medics and Navy corpsmen, the U.S. military’s front-line medical professionals, Carney’s skills translated to almost nothing in the civilian world.
The real culprits are those in charge of the education programs. For decades they have voided past education and experience to increase the time and money spent on worthless, repetitive, and expensive education courses.
My wife is as she and other RNs call it the old fashioned 3 year real RN.
She had 45 hours of pre med at a major medical school in her 3 year program.
As an RN, she was a certified labor and delivery rn, and a certified ICU rn in a hospital affiliated with a major medical school.
She was in the top 5 % in her nursing licensing test in a major state. Her scores were so high, California and another state accredited her to be a RN in their state.
After two kids, she became a stay at home mother. She took the required ce courses to maintain her RN license including a couple of rigorous ICU courses.
Before she returned to work, she decided to a become an rn pa.
She had to take 60 hours of basic bs liberal courses, having nothing to do with nursing.
After about two years, she asked if her pre med courses would count.
She was told no, and she would have retake the basic courses that were the same.
She talked to some friends, who were also 3 year licensed RNs. All of them told her not to waste her money and years of her life.
So, she got a job as the lead RN in a busy FP practice for over 3 decades.
They also limit the number of available nurses.
“explain how their skills wouldn’t immediately apply to EMT style jobs “
Military medics don’t deal with age and drug addict complications.
Check out the types of calls civilian EMTs get: they’re very different from military emergencies.
Of course their advanced skills in trauma should be accredited.
There is also a movement to award more credit for military training and education in various fields, including medicine. Within the last year, governors in Ohio, North Carolina and Virginia have signed executive orders which mandate that state colleges and universities, along with licensing boards, do more to allow military retirees and vets to apply their skills in degree programs and towards certification and licensing.
These changes won’t happen overnight, but it’s a start. There is no reason an Army combat medic, Air Force PJ or Navy independent duty Corpsman shouldn’t be able to apply much of their training towards a nursing or physicians assistant degree, or certification as a paramedic.
Medics in Vietnam saved John Kerry’s life 3 times.
Folks, this is a silly argument. I was a Corpsman in Viet Nam (granted that is ancient history) but I can tell you two things.
The first is that not all Corpsman are the same. Some are bedpan pushers and some are independent duty qualified. So the designation of Corpsman or Medic is not a uniform thing.
The second is that field medical school is oriented toward trauma control and triage for shipping to an aid station. It is a very specialized discipline and, unlike EMTs, you are generally our of touch and on your own. So what you do either works or some poor guy pays a price. However, you know virtually nothing about pharmacology, diagnosis or treatment other than physical injury.
You would, however, be surprised at the number of ex field medical personnel who went on to become physicians or, later, PAs.
To quote an old Gunny that I knew once: “Quiturbitchin” and get on with it.
Here is a good article on post service help for Special Forces (Green Beret) medics.
http://news.unchealthcare.org/news/2015/march/returning-the-favor
“We discovered there’s no better medic on the planet than the 18-Delta Special Forces Medical Sergeant,” he says. “It’s more difficult to become a Special Forces medic than it is to become an NFL football player – it truly is amazing. We are talking about the very best of the best.”
The first course at JSOMTC is the Combat Medic Course, which is taken over six months and is generally considered traditional military medic education. The second, much more selective and demanding course, is the Medical Sergeant Course, which requires an additional six months of training and includes elements of nursing, dentistry, surgery, veterinary medicine, public health, and health-care-related areas.
“You have to remember that these people are soldiers first, and under fire they have to be able to do a number of things quickly and decisively or the mission will fail,” says Cairns. “So, unlike medical school, these folks must train to achieve competence as opposed to be evaluated for performance or to get a grade. These soldiers must graduate from this program knowing how to do a tracheostomy, put in a central line, or stabilize a femur in a combat situation. It’s a different approach.”
As the group from UNC learned more about the level of training and the expertise of the Special Forces medics, they saw an opportunity to help JSOMTC instructors and medic trainees with education and career development. In collaboration with the JSOMTC, the School of Medicine, and UNC Medical Center, the Burn Center launched the Advanced Medic Instructor Training (AMIT) program.
AMIT provides Special Forces medic training instructors who have practiced skills in combat an opportunity to rotate at UNC Hospitals in any specialty they want, whether in the burn unit, the surgical intensive care unit, psychiatry, the emergency department, vascular surgery, or elsewhere.
I am an ex-Army combat medic. I served from 1985-1993 the last five years being inactive reserve. None of the schooling and hands on experience was recognized in the civilian world. I could only become an EMT with a little more school. I laughed and went back to my construction based job as I had performed prior to entering the Army. I do not fault the service by any means but it was my experience that medics are somewhat mislead as to the crossover of what is viable with your work performed while on active duty. Even back then under Reagan the Army was scalping money from those getting near retirement by penalizing for matters many years in the past, that was the reason I did not stay. If they were going to screw decent NCO’s who saw multiple live fire incidents why would I risk giving the bean counters who did nothing but see how best to hurt the soldiers as opposed to the big money contractors or ex-officers milking the system they used to be part of ? Same shit different arena for graft and working the system....anyone here who ever served active knows what I mean.
I got to cross train for a two week program with special forces medics..(they are field surgeons)those guys are great.
Another SOF medic article for you.
http://www.defensemedianetwork.com/stories/special-operations-forces-combat-medicine/
Navy corpsmen are not despite having the same training.
This is the fault of the Secretary of the Navy and Congress.
Perhaps something can / should be worked out with the VA and HHS. Get out as a medic, pass a test and get certified as a paramedic. Fast track OJT training with class room and testing to an LPN. Then enter a formal nursing program after hours to get their RN or other specialty (PT, X-ray, pharm, etc). Those that wish to push on could go and get their PHD.
Who’s arguing? Not me.
After the Vietnam War many of the medics became physician assistants. They ended up working on the Alaska Pipeline, oil rigs and in ERs.
It’s not the sheepskin you need to practice. You need the license.
The same goes for aircraft mechanics who don’t get their a+p license.
The various inputs (various comments)- suggest that things changed - probably for the better - as time went one.
You indicated you could not be an EMT (1980’s) without more school. Others remarked- and they mirrored my daughter’s training - in 2003/2004 - she trained as a Combat Medic (91W at that time, changed since then) - and a part of the Combat Medic course included taking the national EMT test. (She passed.) So the Army training got more significant over time, and the Army took the time to prove the training was valid by having the people take a nationally recognized test.
And the ol’ YMMV...I suspect some posters here with experience availed themselves of additional training, possible additional certification, etc. - and were able to stay in the medical field when they returned to civilian life. (Others might have been precluded from doing the same by having assignments not conducive to that also!)
My daughter was in the Army reserve - and in her civilian time - completed her BS Nursing, got commissioned as an Army Nurse ....trained and qualified as an ICU Nurse (civilian life), got her CCRN certification - and the Army accepted it. And, the Army tends to take an Army nurse with 3 or 4 years experience and THEN send them to train as an ICU nurse; the Army classified my daughter as an ICU nurse about 2 years earlier than what most Army nurses would be able to do if in the Army full-time.
Exactly. But I don't expect the culture will change in my lifetime after 6 terms of degrading leadership...
Ditto with our doctor’s PA...he spent his Army time as a medic. He’s more thorough than the doc, IMO.
I sold a house in 2013, to a vet who was a medic, had deployed to Iraq, and was back home and employed by Los Angeles County, as a Fireman/EMT.
He was early in his career, but was working a lot of hours and making good money.
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