Nurse in the Air Force

Editorial Team / Admin · Apr 29, 2015

Welcome to AN! You may want to try heading over to the Government/Military Nursing forum- you will likely find a wealth of information there.

Silverdragon102, BSN · Apr 30, 2015

Moved to the Government and Military forum

jfratian, DNP, RN, CRNA · Apr 30, 2015

If CRNA is your goal, you absolutely must get your 1-2 years of critical care experience prior to joining the military. Otherwise, you'll need to do 2 years of med-surg, 1 year of a critical care fellowship, and 2 years of ICU when you enter the AF.

The CRNA AFIT program (RN-CRNA) in the AF is extremely competitive (after you jump through all of the hoops I just mentioned). You'd have a much better shot at getting into a civilian CRNA program and direct commissioning upon graduation.

maria_k · Apr 30, 2015

Thank you for responding. One major part of joining now is they not only pay for my student loans I acquired ($30,000) but will pay for the CRNA program (when the time comes.) I know getting to that point will take time, but I plan to make the Air Force a career so I am not in a hurry; plus more years you are in the higher your rank. And truthfully I am ready for change and do not want to be in Wisconsin anymore!

jfratian, DNP, RN, CRNA · May 1, 2015

What is it with people leaving Wisconsin? I have 4 nurses I work out of 30 from Wisconsin.

I was sitting in your position a few years ago. Consider what happens if you don't get CRNA. Will you be satisfied with your career if you have to do CNS or NP? Just something to think about. You'll owe at least 7 years if you take the ICU fellowship after 2 years of med-surg (4 for loan repayment plus 5 for fellowship with 2 years of overlap). At that point, you're pretty much in for 20.

If you get 1 year of civilian ICU experience, you'll come in with 6 months of credit toward O-2 (so only lost 6 months of rank time). Then, you'll be able to bypass the 2 years of med-surg and 1 year fellowship. Plus you won't owe the 5 years for the fellowship. You'll still be eligible for loan repayment at that point too.

maria_k · May 2, 2015

My plan is to make a career out of it so thats kind of the motivation to start now. Also, if the option to get CRNA does not work out I would be okay with CNS or NP - I love that there is so much you can do with nursing and truly have interests in a couple areas not just CRNA. I guess my mentality is that yes I plan to stay in until I retire from nursing altogether and I want to wait to start a family until I have been accepted and at my first assignment. You mention the 1 year of ICU experience as a civilian - I was thinking that if I do not get accepted in August I will continue to build my resume (hopefully with an ICU position) and apply next fiscal year. My recruiter has been very straightforward and states that it is competitive so I have to prepare to go to plan B if I do not get accepted this year. Thank you for responding - it is a lot to think about and I have been getting both pro's and con's from people I talk to so Ive been trying to do more research.

jfratian, DNP, RN, CRNA · May 2, 2015

Take it from me (3 years and counting): inpatient med-surg sucks. Avoiding it is a big plus.

maria_k · May 3, 2015

Where was your assignment for med-surg? Definitely taking what you say in consideration. My recruiter said if I were working in the ER Id have a better change getting accepted this year - would a year of ER experience as a civilian help bypass the med-surg?

jfratian, DNP, RN, CRNA · May 4, 2015

Alaska. ER, OR, ICU, mental-health, OB/L&D, and NICU are civilian specialties that the AF recognizes with a specialty identifier code. In other words, having a year or more of experience in any of the will lock you in to working in that area (more or less). Otherwise, you'll be a general clinical nurse. That means they can put in you in an outpatient clinic or med-surg. That's what happened to me.

The AF doesn't recognize civilian peds, flight, or PACU civilian experience. There is a flight designator, but you can only get it with an internal AF training program.

I recommend ICU, since it is a universal pre-requisite before entry into any CRNA program. If you do ER, then you'll have to do 2 assignments (4+ years) before you're eligible to switch to ICU.

Camo-angel · May 5, 2015

Just curious maria, what area of nursing are you in currently? Med-surg?

maria_k · May 6, 2015

I am currently at a rehabilitation hospital, which Ive been fortunate to be learning a lot of skills; I have a ER interview coming up. I have had no luck getting into the ICU..