Officer vs Enlisted

[prettywheelchair]

Hmmm, I saw a post on here about officer commisions which caught my attention. I am currently in the DEP pool, enlisted as a corpsman on the NCS program. I am a 4 year college grad with a degree in microbiology, spent the last 2 years working in an infectiousdisease laboratory. Basically I want to get into med school, but woke up one day with an itch only FMF corpsman could scratch...so I strolled into a recruiters office, and inevitably ended up enlisting. I didn't seek commision because as it was explained to me if I tried to go officer, it would not be in the medical field because I do not already hold a medical degree. Being an officer and corpsman would be ideal, although my recruiters painted a picture of me behind a desk. Even the officer recruiter just tried to get me into some scholarship program that would pay for med school, but did little to offer me anything for the here and now. I am guaranteed E3 as a corpsman, but I saw somone makemention of being an officer corpsman (probably meant nursing corps?)...? Anyone have any info on such a thing? mainly, how I would go about seeking an officer commision of this sort? What would be the determining criteria for acceptance?Any difference in medical training? WouldI be assigned to a marine unit, and would I be deployable in the same role as an enlisted corpsman? Any information would go a long way, THANKS!

[old navy]

If you are itching to be a corpsman, then go to Corps School and FMSS. With a degree in microbiology you could possibly get a commission in the Medical Service Corps as a lab officer. That won't scratch the itch. To be a nurse, you have to go to nursing school. Again, you'll still be itchy. There are no officer corpsmen that I know of.

[Da-Chief]

Shipmate,

First of all you got yourself into one hell of a program. Do you have any questions about NCS or you know what you got yourself into?


As for Nursing.. once in, Apply for the MECP program for NURSING, they will then commission you as a ENSIGN after paying for Nursing school. I have been home sick all week, but will find the info and put it out there for you.

ALso how old are you?

later

HMC

[prettywheelchair]

Hey guys, thanks for the clarification...it's hard not yet being surrounded by naval life, and to try and seperate the tid bits I hear into fact and fiction. As far as the NCS program goes chief, I am starting to get an entirely different impression from when I signed the initial contract. I actually called my recruiter yesterday based on some of the threads on this site to try and take a closer look into going full on active duty. My only issue originally was a baseline 4 year contract, which would put off med school applications for a bit longer then I had hoped. But it seems like I would get a lot more out of it in the end. But I need to marinate on it for a bit...I have a few months until I ship.

[old navy]

If you want to be a doctor, then go ahead and apply to med school. Of course, you can still try after your time as a corpsman is over if you choose that route. When I taught'A' school in the middle 80's, we had students with degrees who wanted to serve 1 tour as a corpsman and then move on. People want to be Navy Corpsmen for various reasons.

[kamon8404]

prettywheelchair wrote: Hmmm, I saw a post on here about officer commisions which caught my attention. I am currently in the DEP pool, enlisted as a corpsman on the NCS program. I am a 4 year college grad with a degree in microbiology, spent the last 2 years working in an infectiousdisease laboratory. Basically I want to get into med school, but woke up one day with an itch only FMF corpsman could scratch...so I strolled into a recruiters office, and inevitably ended up enlisting. I didn't seek commision because as it was explained to me if I tried to go officer, it would not be in the medical field because I do not already hold a medical degree. Being an officer and corpsman would be ideal, although my recruiters painted a picture of me behind a desk. Even the officer recruiter just tried to get me into some scholarship program that would pay for med school, but did little to offer me anything for the here and now. I am guaranteed E3 as a corpsman, but I saw somone makemention of being an officer corpsman (probably meant nursing corps?)...? Anyone have any info on such a thing? mainly, how I would go about seeking an officer commision of this sort? What would be the determining criteria for acceptance?Any difference in medical training? WouldI be assigned to a marine unit, and would I be deployable in the same role as an enlisted corpsman? Any information would go a long way, THANKS!


Well if you want to be a doctor, then go for it. There are doctors that serve with the Marine Corps. whom the HMs work under. I would suggest watching this video, and then you could decide. This is what made me stay away from becoming an officer, and this is what keeps me in the corpsman rating. Everyone on my staff keeps begging me to put in a package for a commission, but everytime I watch this, or put on that uniform, I get quickly reminded of why I am here and I do what I do.

http://www-nmcp.mar.med.navy.mil/HMTraining/UnsungHeroesHospitalCorpsman.wmv

SF - HM2

[Da-Chief]

You know I have tried everywhere to get that file, Thanks, I was able to download it and will psot it here locally for anyone.

Thanks again!
HMC