Navy, Air Force & Army

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I'm having a hard time deciding on which branch to join. Does one or the other have better training/experience for nurses? I'm leaning toward the Navy and Air Force as second... then, the Army.

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Specializes in critical care: trauma/oncology/burns.

HI

I think the first step you should take is make use of this wonderful forum. Type in a search for Air Force, Army, Navy and spend a few hours reading (smile)

Then go to the various web sites:

www.goarmy.com, www.navy.com, and I believe www.af.com(?) but this last one please don't trust my memory. It is a miracle that I am able to access all nurses.com today. Usually the Internet is down (in my neck of the woods, anyway)

Good Luck. You have a lot to think about. How far along are you towards your journey meaning: are you already licensed as an RN? Do you have your BSN?

athena

Iraq

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Specializes in Sub-Acute/Psychiatric/Detox.

50% of all of the Army Nurses are civilian. Nothing wrong with that. I assume the civilian nurses work at large army hospitals like Walter Reed or other base hospitals.

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Thank you very much for the reply. I will graduate with my BSN in August 2010.

I've done a lot of research and keep seeing that the army has the best training for nurses. My gut keeps telling me to choose the Navy. They all have pros and cons, which makes it such a tough decision for me. Just throwing these thoughts out there - any advice/responses would be great:

Army - Great training for my nursing career, but my gut tells me no due to being on the front line.. Deployment rates report to be high and for longer periods of time

Navy - The travel and locations are very appealing.. I have read that you move around a lot with the Navy.

Air Force - Travel is appealing.. I have read that the deployment rates are lower. The Air Force recruiter told me he couldn't get me in a uniform until March - this leaves me hanging from August to March. I prefer to get right in after I pass my boards.

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It may be that you'll wait regardless of the branch - look around on the forum and you'll see varying lengths of time. I'm prior enlisted Air Force and it took me three months after my package was completed to get an acceptance - and building the package took nine months.

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