Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences (USU)

The Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USU) was founded to be "America's medical school for uniformed physicians." Located in Bethesda, Maryland, USU looks for aspiring medical students with a passion for service who thrive in a collaborative environment.

Since all USU students are active-duty service members, their education is paid for by the U.Due south. government, and they receive a military machine salary and benefits, including a housing allowance. The USU accepts both civilian and armed services applicants for commissioning into the Army, Navy, Air Force and U.S. Public Health Service.

Life at USU - Our school of Medicine

Listen in as USU students share their experiences at America's Medical School.

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Life at USU - Our school of Medicine

Heed in as USU students share their experiences at America's Medical School.

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BURNHAM: when I remember about what it ways to be a student at USU information technology comes back to this idea of similar a shared purpose and a shared mission. It's a really welcoming place and I've made a lot of actually awesome friends and it really does kind of accept that kind of similar home feeling with all of our classmates and nosotros hang out in the student lounge, and we report together in the library and definitely a very similar community feel. It's a actually driven group of people so anybody's you know working very difficult and too having a lot of fun. [Music] HARPER: Everybody here has a unlike walk of life that they came from. Myself I came from prior service every bit a lab tech where I kind of just worked in the lab but i've met people who have gone to nepal and spent years in that location living amidst the people there and really speaking the language and getting a adventure to actually understand the cultures and what they learned at that place they bring back and I learn it helps me to exist more than empathetic for patients that i don't understand or cultures I don't empathise. We have students from Hispaniola that I never fifty-fifty thought well-nigh is you know coming from here being that it's the dominican republic and Haiti at the aforementioned time which you take a culture that's mixed and you get a chance to just sympathise different things about different people and how how they lived how they got here and it kind of helps motivate you and understand that your story is simply as important equally the next person'south story. We're a team here when everybody succeeds we the whole team succeeds if one person is struggling, we're going to make sure that they catch upwards and and they succeed equally well with us. [Music] BURNHAM: All of your professors and all of your classmates are very much here for you and here to help if yous need anything so it feels like a collaborative um push button to like acquire and and to effigy things out and to really kind of similar understand how the human body works and how being a doctor works and they are making sure that nosotros take like the skills and the like emotional competencies and capabilities to really exist exceptional providers because we're going to be the ones treating non just them merely like their families. When I get to the library to study it's not merely so that I can learn this so that I um you know can get a test score. It's so that I tin larn this so that I can exist a better doctor that I can you know serve my land and serve um people who are making incredible sacrifices every day of their life and I remember that sense of vision and mission and collaboration is really like permeates everything nosotros exercise at USU. [Music] HARPER: Whatever support that you're looking for regardless of your ethnicity your background your family situation you're going to find it hither. The war machine is a family, and nosotros really mean that so when you sign that paperwork hither you're joining a family non join non just joining a medical school. [Music]

Operation Bushmaster: Didactics Leadership

Catch fourth-year USU students in activeness during Operation Bushmaster.

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Operation Bushmaster: Teaching Leadership

Catch fourth-yr USU students in action during Functioning Bushmaster.

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NARRATOR: In some form or another all graduating medical students and now our graduating advanced practice nurses have performed during Operation Bushmaster. (screaming) Information technology's a combination of being an first-class clinician, so they have to know the medical part of this, but they as well have to have kind of a more subjective feeling of beingness able to atomic number 82 and lead their peers which is a very difficult matter to do sometimes. They all switch out in their leadership roles and so they're not always in a position where they're the ones making the large decisions, but they're e'er going to be in a back up role within the battalion and the platoon. "Nosotros got more people." "Help." "We got three." "Please aid." "Y'all need to speak up." USU is the only Medical School in the land that has a section of armed services and emergency medicine. Bushmaster is the but practise of its kind, non only within the military medical community, just really inside the Department of Defence force. Zip really comes upwardly to this level of complication in this level of depth of noesis that we expect out of our students.

Tuition + Pay

Your USU education is paid for by the U.Due south. government, and yous volition receive the same agile-duty pay and benefits as are given to a 2d lieutenant in the Army or Air Force or an ensign in the Navy. You will be paid on the starting time and fifteenth of every calendar month. The current pay in the fiscal year for 2019 to 2020 in the greater Washington, D.C., area is over $70,000 yearly. If you take any questions virtually your pay, you should contact the USU Office of the Commandant.

Specialized Officer Training

During the showtime xviii months of grooming, you will be taught by a mix of noncombatant and military instructors, and you lot will participate in classes, lab piece of work and medical field exercises. Then you lot will embark on 12 months of rotations at military, civilian and veterans affairs (VA) medical facilities. Your last eighteen months of rotations volition help guide you lot toward a residency and auditioning for programs that you prefer. During this time, you will also have the opportunity to railroad train at military handling facilities around the world, including on humanitarian missions.

Application Checklist

  • Determine if you are eligible to apply.
  • Utilize to USU through the American Medical Higher Application Service (AMCAS), the centralized awarding service for medical schools, using designation code 821. Learn more than near how to apply to medical schools with AMCAS.
  • Once USU receives your primary application, you lot will be asked to fill up out a secondary application which includes personal essays and checklists regarding your past coursework and required data non included in your primary application, including a personal statement course and checklists regarding your past coursework.
  • After receiving your completed AMCAS awarding, secondary material and messages of recommendation, the admissions commission will cull which students they volition interview.
  • The interview trip involves in-person interviews and a tour of the campus, including a visit to the USU Wide Area Virtual Surround, which immerses students in a 3D battlefield medical scenario.
  • During the interview trip, applicants will also rank which Services they would similar to bring together if they are accepted past USU. Learn more about the different Military Services.
  • If offered an interview, applicants are required to obtain a physical examination through the Department of Defense Medical Examination Review Board and run across all medical qualifications before they matriculate.

Note: If you are an active-duty commissioned service member or in the Reserve officers Training Corps (ROTC) or a Service academy, your application process will be the same as for civilians, except yous will need to request a alphabetic character of approval (LOA) to apply to USU from your Service co-operative. If y'all are an active-duty enlisted service member or officer, you will also need an LOA from your commander. Finally, if you are in the Reserve, you volition need to request permission from your commanding officeholder.
If you have any questions, you can plow to the USU Office of Recruitment and Admissions at admissions@USU.edu.

Learn More Virtually USU

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Interview Procedure + Tips

Information technology is of import that applicants consider and can conspicuously articulate their genuine motivation to commence on a career in military medicine with concrete examples and reasons for this decision. Applicants should also sympathize what it ways to not merely be a physician merely too a commissioned officeholder in the Armed services or U.S. Public Health Service. Applicants should too have a personal awareness of their own strengths, weaknesses, and abilities to piece of work in teams with others. Higher up all else, exist honest and 18-carat with your answers.

Service Commitment

Afterwards USU students finish their residency, they serve on active duty for seven years. Your specific role will depend on your training and the Military's needs. Another option for fulfilling your service commitment involves becoming a general medical officer (GMO) after y'all receive your license. In this position, your role would be like to that of a general medical practitioner, except you are attached to a specific unit of measurement, air wing, send or submarine. This position is open to service members in the Navy and Air Strength.