Nurses in the Armed Forces are commissioned officers; they have been entrusted with the confidence and trust of the President and work under his (or her) orders, and receive a commission from the President and Congress to execute those orders. An officer takes an oath to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States, against all enemies, foreign and domestic;obey the orders of the President, and those of the orders of officers appointed over him or her.

Sounds intimidating, but it really isn't. A nurse in the Army, Navy, or Air Force (Navy provides to Marines and Coast Guard, last time I checked) is commissioned a second lieutenant or ensign, the first officer rank. I can speak about the Army where I was "raised." A nurse obviously works for the doc in the specialty area where he or she is assigned. A combat support hospital (CSH) will have an ER, lab, X-ray, pharmacy, surgery, ortho, etc. A nurse will have medics; basically an EMT now, prior to graduating from the medic course, they pass the national EMT exam. The nurse directs those medics to do what he or she wants done. The nurse in a CSH has A LOT of responsibility, stress, heartache, and accomplishments.

To become an officer, you need a Bachelor's Degree. That is non-negotiable. You do not need, however, to take ROTC in college. Nurses can be direct commissioned. That is, you want to sign up, you are a nurse, have a BSN (or BA with ASN), are licensed in a state to practice. Once you pass the physical, basically I believe you are in. You will take the Oath of Office and start serving our country.

Fort Sam Houston, Texas, near San Antonio is where all Army medical officers go for training. You will learn the paperwork (HA, thought you were done with that?????), how to be a soldier first; by doing all the infantry type training. Yes, nurses carry weapons; you will need to learn how to shoot a M16 or M4 rifle or a M9 9mm pistol, and qualify with that weapon. Most important, you will learn how to be a nurse in combat.

That is the basics, friends. I'll look up more specifics as the summer wears on, and then I start school August 21st.

Hi Telia. You are not expected to get an advanced degree, but it cannot hurt you when your packet goes before a board for promotion. As far as specialty medical courses, not sure how hard they are to get, but as short as the civilian and military sides are in nurses, I can assume it is fairly difficult, because a nurse in school is not providing care. However, on the Army side, I think you can combine schools before going out to a unit or post hospital. Such as doing the Basic Course and somehting else, or the Advanced Course and something else. EFMB is a skill badge, I don't know what you need to do to get it, but I do know you treat "patients" in a combat simulation, complete with grenade/artillery simulators going off, smoke grenades thrown, yelling and screaming, etc. I was at the Artillery school trying to call in fire when they were testing for it.

Nurses in the military must also do the same schools required for promotion in that service. E.G., the Nurse Officer Advanced Course must be done before getting promoted to Captain (unless your experience as you described gets you in as a Captain); the Advanced Course is now the Captains Career Course, you grad from Fort Sam Houston, and go to Fort Leavenworth for 6 more weeks on staff training. Airborne, air assault, ranger, and special forces are not required for nurses, but there are plenty that do them. If you get assigned to the 101st Airborne (Air Assault) Division, you will probably be required to do that school (it was required some years ago, the Commanding General ordered it).

I don't see why a NP or CRNA course would not be included in a contract. I'll get in touch with a recruiter and find out. There is also a National Guard PA program, with an age limit of 34-35 (wish I knew about that 6 years ago). Basically, you are already commissioned, do all the prerequisites (which as a nurse you have done), apply for the program, get accepted, and go on active duty for 2 years at Fort Sam, and grad with a Masters from U of Texas (at somewhere). Your obligation for doing that is 6 years in the Guard.

Great info from your side. I didn't know about the constructive credit deal.

As far as me, I am a Major in the Army Guard, graduated from the officer basic and advanced courses in Field Artillery, and Combined Arms Services Staff School. I start nursing school in August.

You must have an associate's degree in nursing or a three-year nursing diploma or a bachelor of science in nursing for the Army Reserve; have a bachelor's degree in nursing (BSN) from an accredited school of nursing for Active Duty.

http://www.goarmy.com/JobDetail.do?id=315&fw=reserveNps

You must have an associate's degree in nursing or a three-year nursing diploma or a bachelor of science in nursing for the Army Reserve; have a bachelor's degree in nursing (BSN) from an accredited school of nursing for Active Duty.

I was just going to add that same thing.  I just had a friend commision in the USAR as a 2nd LT.   You are expected to complete your BSN though within a certain time frame.

            I was aerovac enlisted up until about two months ago (7+ years) with the largest aerovac unit in the world and have been all over the current system, all over the world, and with all different crews from the many other units of this type.  I assure you all that maybe those images written about above were from the VN war rather than being of modern commonplace now.  The environment is very professional and the enlisted are quite respected as the top enlisted techs on the team (i.e. the charge med tech - CMT) runs the aircraft systems of the show.  The RNs on the crew would be in big trouble mission wise without support of a good CMT.  The 'Equal Op.' environment of the Air Force is now very developed these days and Officers, both male and female with the above mentioned attitudes don't do very well in todays Air Force.  They could find themselves at the military prison at Fort Levenworth for a while in that case.  The Regan administration cleaned a great deal of the good old boys military out of the Air Force in the eighties and most of the drugs left over from the VN military.  Regular and random drug testing was also started with Regan.  Sometimes bad things happen here and there like in any large organization, but it has really been cleaned up since the post Carter adminstration days.  Regan started a movement that was like a boulder rolling down a hill that kept going, hence it smashed a lot of bad things in the military, but spaired much of the good soldiers, salors, airmen, coasties, and last but not least the marines for a better military overal in the end.

High hopes & God speed - Tim, R.N.