I won't be surprised if there has been a waiting list:
<blockquote>Complaints of "second class treatment" from dozens of Army reservists and National Guard personnel are understandable but invalid, the garrison commander of this sprawling military base said Tuesday.
Col. John Kidd said the reservists' and guard members' complaints that they play second fiddle to full-time soldiers are caused not by a double standard, but by a severe shortage of physicians and other medical personnel.
"You don't get physicians at Wal-Mart," Kidd said in an interview aimed at explaining a controversy that exploded over the weekend. The issue is based on allegations that injured and sick reservists have been receiving shoddy, sloppy and painfully slow treatment compared with regular Army soldiers. "We are saturated," Kidd said. "We are overflowing, in hospitals and billets. And this is understandable because we are in a war."
A team from the Pentagon arrived Monday night to investigate the allegations, many made anonymously to news organizations. The Pentagon team included the deputy surgeon general of the Army, several physicians and administrative experts to offer advice on how Kidd can speed up the process of evaluating, rehabilitating, redeploying and discharging injured soldiers.
Kidd said 740 reservists and guard members are in a virtual state of limbo. Some are waiting for administrative reasons, but 633 are on "medical hold," awaiting examinations, surgeries and "repair." Of that number, 15 were wounded in action in Iraq. At least 213 were never deployed to the war with their units because of injuries suffered in training here or because of illnesses discovered after they were mobilized. (Bill Hendrick, "Brass: Reservists Not Mistreated: Fort Stewart Short of Staff, Official Says," <em>Atlanta Journal Constitution</em>, October 22, 2003, <a href="http://www.ajc.com/news/content/news/1003/22fortstewart.html">)</blockquote>
>Boy, I'm sure Grenada really kept 'em busy for several years.
Also, even completely excluding injuries resulting from the US military's operations overseas, the military is among the most hazardous occupations: "Over the period from 1992 to 2001, 6,455 employees of a government entity were fatally injured while at work. . . . . 1,135 workplace fatalities occurred in military occupations [These fatalities are for the resident military population only. Fatalities occurring among U.S. military personnel outside the United States are not included]" (Stephen M. Pegula, "Fatal Occupational Injuries to Government Workers, 1992 to 2001," <a href="http://www.bls.gov/opub/cwc/print/sh20040223ar01p1.htm">February 24, 2004</a>). And that's counting only fatal injuries.
Chuck Grimes wrote:
>If you are in military service as a physician, then you depend on
>the kinds of cases that arrive and that is something you can't
>control or cherry pick. So if you want certification in some
>lucrative procedure that is usually elective like a nose job, breast
>implant, or tummy tuck how would you get such certification as an
>military surgeon?
>
>I can't see any way except to have such elective procedures offered
>for free. This would then be an incentive for recruiting and
>retaining physicians and surgeons.
That makes sense, as facilitating transition to civilian careers is probably much cheaper for the Pentagon than to offer its surgeons compensation packages that are more favorable than what the same doctors would be able to expect in the civilian world.
>On the other hand how many trauma and restoration cases come along
>in private practice? Traffic accidents and burns would be the only
>big sources.
Industrial accidents in the civilian world (cf. <a href="http://stats.bls.gov/iif/home.htm">"Injuries, Illnesses, and Fatalities"</a>) probably produce many trauma cases that are very similar to military injuries, requiring reconstructive surgery. I doubt that they can be a source of lucrative careers, though, as working-class patients won't have much money. -- Yoshie
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