MilMed with Pre-Existing Condition

[FutureSerf]

I'm not in med school (currently in PA didactic year), but wanted to ask a couple of questions. I've lurked on this specific forum and have read about potential enlistees needing to be willing to deploy, being aware of issues within milmed etc. Sorry in advance if my posting here ruffles any feathers; this forum seems more likely to give a straight answer than recruiters or other resources out there for PA's.

I have IBD, am in my early 30's, and don't have any children. I've had an underlying desire to give back through service for quite a while, but admittedly have vacillated periodically. Not sure if it's relevant, but I'm not in the same camp as my future colleagues regarding unsupervised practice for midlevels.

1. From what I've read online, IBD does not outright result in disqualification from enlisting; I'm assuming it depends on progression of dz, ability to function with it, etc. From what you've experienced firsthand or seen through your colleagues, how does the military handled pre-existing health issues? Does one service seem to have less barriers to joining versus another?

2. Given my age in combination with a health issue & prior waxing/waning, should I put any thoughts of joining the mil on the backburner?

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[SirGecko]

Inflammatory bowel disease is disqualifying to join the military. See DOD Instruction 6130.03. That’s a joint instruction covering all three services. I’m sure that you’ll find in enumerated in the individual service standards as well. (I know it’s also on the MANMED, the Navy instruction) In order to join you would need a waiver. If it’s well controlled without a history of flairs maybe they would let you join if the are hurting for PAs? The problem with taking you though is if your disease at all precludes you from being world wide deplorable (read: austere environment where *you* may be the entire medical asset) it’s kind of a waste of time for the military.

EDIT: Also like Gastrapathy says below I’ve definitely submitted med boards for people with IBD to get out of the navy and even when I’ve been able to get a waiver in the past it’s come with duty restrictions so I think the military would have to have a compelling reason to grant you one to join when they haven’t already invested in you.

 

[Gastrapathy]

I’m not sure where you read that. There are two sets of standards, one for joining and one for being allowed to stay. The second are less stringent but despite that nearly all IBD patients are not able to continue military service. For example, Isolated left-sided UC, people with high value jobs (je physicians), and some other exceptions but they were all in the .mil prior to diagnosis.

 

[Matthew9Thirtyfive]

Agree with the above. A guy in my commissioning program got diagnosed with IBD during the process and was med boarded out. This was a guy who had already been on active duty for years and who had gone through a very expensive two-year postbacc to commission into MilMed. It’s probably not very likely someone with IBD would get a waiver to commission when the military hasn’t invested anything in them yet.

 

[AubPharm2015]

This thread made me login.

Long story short, I was presented with an opportunity to rectify two regrets: not going to medical school to begin-with and never joining the military. I was about to start the MilMed journey but discovered anemia is a disqualifier.

I was diagnosed with B12 deficiency a few months ago and went through the initial replenishment regimen and am now receiving monthly injections. The origin was never identified. From what I can tell, this basically means my game is over before it ever begins as I'll never get this waiver and probably will need injections for quite some time.

Am I correct?

 

[FutureSerf]

Thanks for the responses.

 

[Fried Plantaris]

This isn't official advice but you could always lie about it like many other do

 

[SirGecko]

This isn't official advice but you could always lie about it like many other do

Bad advice. Do not lie about your medical history.