[RhinofromWA]

They do that...there just aren't enough to occupy 100% of their time.

SO why train so many doctors to do it?

I wish people got this spun up about things that matter. But the average American seems to think and care more about boob jobs than accurately assessing foreign policy and world conditions.

MD

Dropping 2 million dollars on unneccessary cosmetic surgery is a decent number to me.

This has caused such a stir because it is simple enough in its issue. It is easy to see how obsurd (my spelling is obsurd: ) the idea of doing elective boob jobs to military personel by a military doctor. There is no GOOD reason for it. Nothing the doctor gets from that proceedure that they can't get by actually helping military personel in need. Their skills can be better used somewhere else.,,within the military. Like I said the reason it has even the simpletons speaking out is even they can see the missapproriation of govermental surgons.

Foriegn policy, the "experts" don't know what they are doing and the rest of us are at a loss to even grasp it as a whole. No one has the secret that can save the world (Cue the Beattles "All we Need is Love")

It is admirable that you try and direct attention away from a multi-million dollar waste subject to other issues. But don't try and minimalize the effect and PR crap this puts out to the public.

I am not sayign teh doctors need to work on civilians......though I offerd it up before. I am saying there are more pressing personel in need of their services than Ms Jane Perky Doe.

 

[MikeD]

SO why train so many doctors to do it?

Because we want to plan for the workload when people start coming back from wars overseas all jacked up, not during times of relative peace.

Dropping 2 million dollars on unneccessary cosmetic surgery is a decent number to me.

But where's the expenditure? There may be an opportunity cost, but there's no liquidation of funds associated with the procedures that's borne by the government, except perhaps expendable items associated with the surgery, like scalpel blades and bandages.

The cost of paying the doctors, because there are too many of them? See my point #1.

I am not sayign teh doctors need to work on civilians......though I offerd it up before. I am saying there are more pressing personel in need of their services than Ms Jane Perky Doe.

OK, who ARE these personnel, and if they're in need, why aren't they getting the treatment they deserve?? That'd cause the biggest problem in my eyes...if people who needed surgery couldn't get it. The boob jobs are going in after the necessary care is taken care of.

Edit: Also see my edits above, written as you were responding.

 

[Silver]

2 million dollars is NOTHING.

You're an accountant Rhino...c'mon. You know you're arguing about a 5 cent mistatement on the balance sheet of a company that is worth $100,000,000.

In accountant terms, it's not material.

 

[genpowell71]

We had a tricare brief last week about the new things that tricare is going to offer. Alot of servicemen's chief complaint was that the army wouldnt pay for bresat implants. So, tricare did a study and decided that it would offer breast augmentation to those women who needed it due to illness (cancer etc) and to women that lost "significant" size after prenancy. The catxh is that it's one time and it still costs the family member about $2000 for the procedure. Its not going to be one of those "if you want big t*ts come and get'em" things. Army doctors have to have documentation that the family member knows what she's getting herself into. Believe me, this is going to be more trouble than it's worth...

 

[MikeD]

It was a hot day, and in the 'nam, hot meant HOT. "Doc" Rhino was working his hardest; sweat poured from under his steel pot as he labored to save the lives of the tortured, mangled men around him...but today, it was even tougher. A new combat replacement was finally in to replace the last corpsman, who'd been lost to a landmine a moonth earlier. Having such a liability around was harder than having no one at all...Doc would have to break him in quickly.

"Kid," he began, "here's where you'll be. Doing triage in the rear. That'll keep you busy, and you'll see the worst of the worst before you actually have to do anything. So, when you're puking your own guts out because some poor schmoe's just spilled his out his belly in front of you, you won't be putting my life or the lives of any of the old-timers on the line. Here's what you do...."

They walked past the dead, the dying, and those who wished they were dying. They were heaped like coal and stacked like cordwood...but Doc's heart, though it knew of the tough reality of war, cried out against his stern countenance as they passed each man and pronounced his sentence.

"Expecant," said Doc sharply. The kid covered his mouth, holding back the gorge and keeping the scent off. Doc stabbed him with a syrette of morphine, then another...and another. "He's gone, kid...might as well help him on the way," shrugged Doc as he left the mangled, screaming torso behind. "Just mark his forehead with that marker and put the syrettes in his pocket...this way people know what he's in for. "Routine" said Doc, seeing the next casualty, a compound leg fracture who was moaning and sobbing. The kid readied a syrette. "Hold it, kid," said Doc. "You'll want to save that for those who need it. He'll be OK. Mark him." The kid drew a smudged "R" with the marker on the man's sweaty, bloodied brow...this doomed him to evacuation at a later, less urgent time. In the meantime, he'd sit and bleed and moan while they got those closer to death off to higher levels of care than this stinking field battalion aid station could provide. "Urgent!" snapped Doc, seeing the next patient. "Morphine and tag him; he needs evac, pronto...nothing we can do for him here, but he might live!" said Doc, pointing to a vaguely man-shaped pile of blood and entrails. The kid searched for a forehead on which to put the "U" to indicate the level of triage.

Suddenly, Doc stopped, like a cat, and reached into the pile of bodies. He grabbed the kid's chest as he was trying to write and screamed, "Jesus, Kid, don't just stand there, DO SOMETHING!" He indicated the woman he'd just pulled from the pile.

The kid stared in wonder. She was unbloodied, intact...except for the giant, gaping lack of bosom. "God," thought Doc..."it was like this my first time, too...when it gets really bad, you don't even get sick. It's just too much to believe." He smacked the Kid, snapping him back to reality. "MARK HER!" he screamed. The kid lept into action, hastily scrawling a legible "B" on her head. "Not bad," thought Doc. "He'll be OK."

"Now get her out of here! STAT!" He and the Kid pulled the victim from the pile, stepping on broken bones, slipping on lengths of intestine, caring only for their most precious of patients. Leaving the pile of stinking, groaning, leaking, putrid wounded behind, they ran her to the LZ as the first evac bird hit the deck. Laying her on the bird with as much care as they could, they told the crew chief to go...this one had to live, and there was no time to load the rest.

The crew chief shrugged, happy to leave the hot zone as quick as he could, and the Slick pirouetted like a dragonfly-winged rhino as it whisked the nameless, tragically flat-chested girl to safety. They could rest assured that whoever was on the operating table back at the field hospital would be unceremoniously dumped to the floor as soon as she arrived.

"God, Kid, I hope you remember this. Sometime's it's possible..." said Doc, choking up and trying to cover it with a cough. "Sometime's it's possible." But the Kid could see the single tear in Doc's eye, and knew he'd seen enough of war, forever.

-MD

 

[fluff]

If the military surgeons are salaried then the true cost of the surgery is not comparable to the civilian side of things where profit is made.

And unless there is an unreasonable waiting list of essential procedures for them to perform then where is the problem?

Rhino, whilst I disagree with you often I can generally see why you are arguing and where you are coming from. This time it seems like you're arguing for the sake of it.

 

[RhinofromWA]

If the military surgeons are salaried then the true cost of the surgery is not comparable to the civilian side of things where profit is made.

And unless there is an unreasonable waiting list of essential procedures for them to perform then where is the problem?

Rhino, whilst I disagree with you often I can generally see why you are arguing and where you are coming from. This time it seems like you're arguing for the sake of it.

Yet no one has made a convincing agrument as to why breast agumentation should be done on a healthy soldier or family member.....

They have excuses....not reasons to justify the act.

How may bullet proof jackets can be bought with 2 million dollars? I bet the cost is even more when you figure in the overhead of the military and the outside costs associated with haveing a military surgen available.

This is simply for the doctor to have boob job experience when they leave the military. That in it self is a joke. Help the guy bleading to death ot who's missing half his/her (pick a body part)

I agrue because no one sees whats wrong with supporting the missuse of military surgens. That is the problem. If one sees no problem with this then they better close their yap on Haliburton and other excess use of military spending. Though the amount is different the question is the same. Are you for or against missapropriation of military moneys?

My opinion is the liberals have flipped once again and flopped. I guess I could pick my battles but the fundamentals are essentially the same and yet they find no problem with it.

That in itself is interesting.

To everyone (not fluff )

Bring on the flame war! Say how it is a drop in the bucket (though no different other than size) Say the money for haliberton went to benefit private citizens (so does no cost doc fees for cosmetic operations) Though one group is rich and the other is the poor. I guess that is very Robin Hood of you... Say they will be sticking their collective thumbs up their bums....I guess that is more of an issue of usage of military doctors and in a time when they could be used to treat our soldiers that is wrong.

But by all means flame away. Good Wed Morning.

 

[RhinofromWA]

*edited for time*
-MD

Wow

My own movie! Sweet.

I guess if more docs were helping the soldiers instead of stuffing womans chests more lives could be saved. : Damn you doc Rhino! Damn you!

*PS- Truely outstanding MikeD Above and beyond the call of duty, really.

Ever think about being a military boob doctor?

 

[fluff]

Well, the justification was that they may be required to perform reconstruction surgery on wounded women who lose a breast. Hence they would need experience within the military. Plus which military women are just as susceptible to breast cancer and maybe they would be involved in that?

Proviso is that no critical surgery should ever be delayed by non-critical surgery,

It's not that far fetched.

 

[RhinofromWA]

2 million dollars is NOTHING.

You're an accountant Rhino...c'mon. You know you're arguing about a 5 cent mistatement on the balance sheet of a company that is worth $100,000,000.

In accountant terms, it's not material.

True it is a 2 million plus mistake than in terms of a global army is small.

But when you step into reality and look at it what is $2million dollars? That is a lot of stuff. It isn't the only plce the military money could be spent more wisely,.....but it is one and a healthy one considering the undeterminal costs of doctors time not used in working on miltary personel in need.

Of all things a doctors time should be pretty damn important to the soldiers in need.

You are a liberal can't you see that the doctors time can be better used in treating soldiers with more pressing needs? In humane terms it is material. *shrugs*

Guess I am not as conservative as everyone thinks?

 

[RhinofromWA]

Well, the justification was that they may be required to perform reconstruction surgery on wounded women who lose a breast. Hence they would need experience within the military. Plus which military women are just as susceptible to breast cancer and maybe they would be involved in that?

Proviso is that no critical surgery should ever be delayed by non-critical surgery,

It's not that far fetched.

From Toshi article post:

Doctor Legan also stated that solely cosmetic surgery is done only on a space-available basis, and may constitute no more than 10 percent of a plastic surgeon's workload.

He emphasized that such skills are crucial for Air Force doctors to keep pace with their civilian counterparts.

That is the crutch of it some doctors are operating soley to keep abreast(*groan* ) with skills that their civilian counter parts. That has no bearing on the doctors ability to preform a breast implant. Solely their personal (after military service) plastic surgen life.

If the need is so small that the surgens specializing in cosmetic surgery don't have the work load to keep fresh on their skills there are to many plastic surgens in the military. It is that simple. The need for thier services is elsewhere and not in plastic surgery....for the military.

As an accountant I see a wasted resource....that is all. That is plain as day....especially in times like these, doctors are needed elsewhere.

 

[fluff]

Yeah, but it's space available which means they'd otherwise be sat around with the fingers up their arses anyway so what's the harm?

 

[RhinofromWA]

Yeah, but it's space available which means they'd otherwise be sat around with the fingers up their arses anyway so what's the harm?

It means they are under-utilized....wasting money.

IF they are operating for free on non-essential proceedures or sitting on their collective arse they are still wasting the tax payers money....right?

That is why I said if they have that much time to piss around and experiment with cosmetic surgery because they would be giving themselves a prostate exam without it than there are to many doctors that are specializing in cosmetic surgery in the military.

We either have to many doctors or they are not being utilized effectively....I bet soem vetrans on waiting lists for surgery are more worthy than Ms Jan Perky Doe for their free time. Being a veteran @ a veteran hospital, I bet the liability would be nill.

It is simply a waste....if they are that bored.

 

[MikeD]

Wow

My own movie! Sweet.

I guess if more docs were helping the soldiers instead of stuffing womans chests more lives could be saved. : Damn you doc Rhino! Damn you!

*PS- Truely outstanding MikeD Above and beyond the call of duty, really.

Ever think about being a military boob doctor?

Thanks...that post was pure public self-amusement. It's my own personal modern classic, sure to go underappreciated and unnoticed buried here in this thread, lol.

MD

 

[Skookum]

Thanks...that post was pure public self-amusement. It's my own personal modern classic, sure to go underappreciated and unnoticed buried here in this thread, lol.

MD

You been leafin thru too many Reader's Digests in the waiting lobby before your "sessions" or what.....
Stick to admiring pictures in Cat Fancy my freind....

 

[MikeD]

You been leafin thru too many Reader's Digests in the waiting lobby before your "sessions" or what.....
Stick to admiring pictures in Cat Fancy my freind....

Now, while creative writing may not be my bag, baby, stylistic parody is. I'm glad you recognized the Reader's Digest influence, however.

MD

 

[Toshi]

We either have to[sic] many doctors or they are not being utilized effectively....I bet soem vetrans on waiting lists for surgery are more worthy than Ms Jan Perky Doe for their free time. Being a veteran @ a veteran hospital, I bet the liability would be nill[sic].

specialization takes time. for example, to become a plastic surgeon:

4 years college
4 years med school
1 year internship
4 years general surgery residency
2 years plastic surgery residency (http://www.surgery.medsch.ucla.edu/plastic/residencyprogram.shtml for instance)

my point: the supply of plastic surgeons is not easily altered. it takes time for them to filter through the system, and you can't just add/drop them from the payroll. move on to a more worthwhile issue