is there an equivilant job in the service? I have an Associate’s of Applied Science in Medical Assisting/Medical Office Management.
The schooling including a ton of computer courses and Phlebotomy training.
My question is is there a similar job in a military hospital/clinic/medic station or would I expect to be completely re-trained and rinsing bedpans and serving food trays as if all my civilian skills were useless?
Agreeing with SFC M. You would at least go in higher enlisted ranking and your civilian experience would put you ahead of your peers. Your certifications are worth promotion points which get you looked at for promotion possibly sooner than your peers.
go to this website and you can be prepared to tell your recruiter what job you would like. Continue your schooling because you can become an officer with a BA/BS
http://www.us-army-info.com/pages/mos/medical/medical-mos.html
For the Army (every branch is a little different):
Some good news and bad news.
There is no such thing as a Medical Assistant in the Army.
You will receive accelerated promotion for your AS, to at least E-3/PFC, which means an automatic raise of at least $300 per month; regardless of what job you enlist for.
You get to pick what specialty you go into, Lab tech, Vet tech, OR tech, Xray Tech, Hospital Food Service, Medic, etc.
You may receive further advanced promotion to E-4 based on your experience, but you would probably have to join as a Lab Tech.
You may qualify for student loan repayment.
Your education should put you on track to apply for one of the more advanced medical programs, like PA, PT or RN; once you finish your initial training.
No matter what you do, your civilian skills and experience will help you enormously, as they will set you ahead of your peers when it comes time for promotion.
Good Luck
Edit:
With your qualifications, don’t bother with an AMEDD recruiter. If they are polite, they will just refer you back to a regular recruiter. If not, they will laugh you out of their office.
Edit2:
Yggdrasil- I gave you a thumb’s down because you are incorrect about his AS not being worth anything. It is worth E-3 in Army and Navy, at least.
Edit3:
lol at Yggdrasil.
Yes, there are military equivalents, but no, you would still have to take the military training. An A.A./A.S gets you nothing…it is the B.A./B.S. that gets one commissioned.
EDIT: God forbid that I go to bat for Mrs. JVB, but you are crazy. No physician I have ever known came into the military as an O-6…and I was a Staff psychologist in the USAF. You are making this crap up as you go along. Anything above O-4 would be VERY unusual.
…and comparing being a CNA with being an MD/DO is insane!
your ASVAB scores determine what jobs you are eligible for. and there must be an opening in the medical field.
Civilian certs mean nothing.
Hey,
I just started looking into medical jobs with the army, too. If you’ve done this already, sorry for not being able to help – but if you go to this link, basically I entered “medical specialist” into GoArmy’s job/career search. It brought up all of the possible matches. You can check them out and see if there’s one that stands out to you, and at the bottom of each job’s page there is a list of what civilian jobs are equivalent.
You’re going to have to go through BCT (basic combat training) and AIT, which is the specialized training for your field. Your degree won’t bump you out of that. But you can read more about the requirements and stuff like that if you go on the GoArmy site and check out some of their career info.
Check with AMEDD, dont go to a regular recruiter. Army medical program could answer your questions. You can go to a recruiter and ask for a number for AMEDD and they will give it to you. I am a respiratory therapist and when i signed up i wanted to do respiratory and my recruiter did not tell me about AMEDD. If I would have known then what I know now, I could have done exactly what I wanted, but instead I got a crappy job that I hate. If you want to go medical I am telling you it is a good idea to look into it.
Here is their site: http://www.goarmy.com/amedd/