Be all that you can be? Not so fast. Part 1—The Joblessness Trend of Ex-military Medics

General Norman Schwarzkopf, the former Desert Storm Commander, once said that “the truth of the matter is that you always know the right thing to do. The hard part is doing it.” Unfortunately this phrase is extremely well suited to the situation faced by former military medics who are now returning to civilian life only to realize that their military skills and training do not transition to civilian jobs.  The unemployment rate of Iraq and Afghanistan vets has outpaced those of civilians, but when you hear about the nursing shortage, it is easy to wonder how that could possibly be true when almost 10,000 military members separated from their healthcare support jobs last year alone, according to this article.  The answer involves a lot of red tape, and the solution involves even more of it.

Combat medics treat simulated injured infantry Soldiers during a firefight in a village at a Mobile Urban Training Site at Fort McCoy, Wis. The medics had removed the injured Soldiers from the line of fire to stabilize them before evacuation.

The problem doesn’t just affect ex-medics, but also a variety of other military men and women with manufacturing-related skills, who, without civilian credentials cannot secure civilian jobs, according to a 2012 article published by Bloomberg News.   The reason for this is that the military performs all of its own on-the-job training with much of the medical training occurring at Fort Sam Houston, just outside of San Antonio, Texas, where “the armed services turn out about 12,500 combat medics, Navy corpsmen and Air Force medical technicians a year.”  These medics, or “docs” as they’re called on the battlefield, have outstanding training and can complete many tasks like intubation and narcotics administration unlike their civilian counterparts.  At a minimum, they are trained at the certified nursing assistant (CNA) and basic Emergency Medical Technicians (or EMT) levels and above, but they can only sit for the basic EMT exam—not the better paid Paramedic exam—despite being able to perform at the paramedic-level skill set in the military.  Even then, not all of the grads sit for the Basic EMT test—only Army medics and Air Force medical techs take the exam; Navy corpsmen are not required to do this at the end of their training.

The Bloomberg article was written shortly after Congress approved a law in July 2012 that “[declared] military training sufficient for many federal job licenses and certifications.”  However the bill did nothing for licenses and certifications that fall under state jurisdictions, like RN and LPN/LVN licensure, thus it had no benefit to ex-military medical personnel.  According to one article, “the Army, Navy and Air Force offer methods of obtaining civilian certifications before leaving the service. The Army and the Navy, for example, use Credentialing Opportunities Online, or COOL, to help their medic personnel obtain needed civilian certifications.  The Air Force’s Credentialing and Education Research Tool, or CERT… [helps] Air Force enlisted personnel obtain needed civilian certifications, such as for civilian medical assistants.”   The problem with this is that the salary of a basic EMT, according to Indeed.com, ranges from $19,000-$24,000 a year, but a Paramedic’s average salary is $43,000, and an RN’s average salary is $68,000.  Many ex-medics cannot make ends meet in spite of being qualified for higher-paying positions.

As the Obama administration implements plans to reduce the number of boots on foreign ground over the next five years, it anticipates that more than one million military men and women will regain their civilian status.  This is why in May 2012, it created a task force charged with minimizing the differences between military and civilian job requirements.  For former military medics, according to this Modern Healthcare.com article, “the credit awarded for military experience varies depending on location.  Eleven state nursing boards allow graduation from a military medical training program as a substitute for a nursing degree when awarding a nursing license, according to the National Council of State Boards of Nursing.”  This allows students to sit for the NCLEX-RN^®, and upon successful completion of the test, they can work as a Registered Nurse.  However not everyone discharged from the military has the educational background to be an RN immediately upon dismissal; some don’t have the background or the documentation to prove that they’re qualified to be an LPN or LVN either.  The second part of this blog will focus on some incentives the government has created in order to create a workaround for veterans, as well as some examples from various schools across the country.